The Fiddler's Daughter
by Catsitta
Summary: The Angel of Music steals a young Christine in the night. Growing up in his endless world of night changes the infamous tale of the Opera Ghost and his Swedish Soprano, but is it for the better? E/C. AU. Primarily Kay and ALW influences. Dark. A story told in six parts. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: LOOKING FOR A BETA!**

This is my first foray into Phantom of the Opera fanfiction after a watching the movie, a few different versions of the stage show and happily reading Kay's Phantom. There are influences from the original novel, the musical and Kay's retelling. Also, this story is complete but in need of a beta-reader to help with spelling/grammar/diction issues as well as maybe discuss a few plot points. **PM me if you were interested in helping me beta this story**. Thank you for reading.

**Disclaimer: **These aren't my characters, I'm simply borrowing them.

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**The Fiddler's Daughter**

**By Catsitta**

**.1.**

"Papa! Papa wake up. Why won't you wake up?" Blue eyes filled with tears as Christine shook her father. He was so cold, so pale. "Stop it! You're scaring me. Wake up. I promise I won't be naughty and eat all the sweet biscuits again. I won't complain about my singing lessons. I-I'll sing right now. You love it when I sing."

Quietly, she began to hum, her throat tight as she combed quivering fingers through Gustav Daaé's thinning hair. For the past few winters fever plighted the Swedish violinist and Christine nursed him through every shivering, sweating night. A task which would usually fall upon the wife, fell upon the shoulders of the daughter like an albatross. At eight years of age, Christine knew more about sickness and loss than any child should.

Her Mama was in heaven, singing soprano in a choir of angels. She curled her hand around Gustav's and began to sob. God had a fiddler at the golden gates now.

'_When I go to heaven, I will send the Angel of Music to you, Christine.' _

With her Papa's promise floating in her ears, she opened her mouth and poured her grief and pain into music. Christine's voice never wavered as she gave life to words she at last understood, her pitch climbing into the heavens, as if she could herald the Angel of Music with song alone. As the last note reached the rafters of the small room in the Palais Garnier Opera House, where Gustav recently secured a position with the orchestra, she felt a small piece of herself shatter and the crystalline melody ended in a wail of despair.

An orphan in an Opera House. Christine clutched at the bedclothes as she buried her face against her papa's motionless chest. She was nothing more than an orphan in an Opera House. No longer the doted upon daughter of famous violinist, but a poor girl with no money to bury her Papa. When the manager realized Gustav was dead, he would send her to the nunnery—or worse, force her onto the streets—and her Papa would be buried in an unmarked grave.

Christine choked through another fit of tears, her tangled riot of curls sticking painfully against raw eyelids and cheeks. Why did Papa have to go to heaven? God had a symphony. Christine had nothing except an old violin with fraying strings. Her whole body shook violently at the thought. Papa would never play again, there would be no more sweet music coaxed from the petulant instrument on dreary winter nights. No more silly ditties plucked beneath the shade of a tall oak during the glaring summer afternoons.

She shuddered.

A knock shattered her smothered silence.

"Monsieur Daaé?" a small voice bid from behind the wooden barrier. Most likely a stagehand was sent to fetch Gustav when he did not appear at rehearsals. "Monsieur Daaé, you are late."

A tremulous Christine shifted away from her father's prone form to crack open the door. "My Papa is ill," she said in hesitant, accented French—Swedish was her native language, but her Papa taught her as many fragments of languages as he could during their travels through the countryside. When the boy, a lad of perhaps thirteen or so, frowned down his oversized nose at her in disbelief, she jerked her chin high with bravado. "He needs sleep."

The boy attempted to peer through into the room, but Christine was quick to shut the door. She listened to him mutter on the other side, before shuffling away, most likely to deliver her message to the conductor, Monsieur Reyer. Perhaps the news would travel to Madame Giry as well, so the ballet mistress would not seek out Christine for her dance lessons with the troupe. Christine hated dancing. Singing was where her gifts lied.

However, those gifts were likely to soon go to waste.

She turned to stare at the corpse "sleeping" peacefully in his bed. Suddenly quite sick, Christine gripped her stomach and slid to the floor.

"Papa…I need you."

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At some point, Christine closed her eyes and fell asleep. The worry had taxed her little body into a fitful stupor, her shallow sleep haunted by goblins and ghosts. Twisting and whimpering, she fought the feverish onslaught of grinning faces and clawed hands as they tugged at her skirts. But they pulled her under. Deeper and deeper into the dark, further and further away from the sky. Until there was no more sun. No more light. No more music.

The promised angel left her to drown in oblivion.

Gasping, Christine awoke, her hands scrabbling for purchase on the wooden floor. A floor which she fell asleep on. A floor which upon which she was no longer. Her bitten nails clawed against fabric softer than a cloud—her eyes greeted with the blackness of hell. _Where am I? _she wondered, but the thought was quickly replaced with terror. Heedlessly, without thought to who or what might be behind her situation, too overwhelmed by the day's events to think through the panic, Christine screamed.

She screamed and screamed and screamed. Not high, girlish shrieks, the kind a child makes when a caterpillar lands on their nose or when a game of chase becomes too rough. No, her screams were primal, and quickly Christine was lost in the rawness. It felt as if she were dying on the inside, not slowly, she wasn't rotting or withering or festering, she was drowning, being trampled upon, being sliced open upon the keenest knife.

Unlike when her agonized sorrow took flight, no song flooded forth from her soul. Just sound. Fear and pain at its most basic.

She heard nothing but her own horror…until the music began. It did not caress, nor did it coax. There was nothing sweet about the first few notes which battered against her skull. In a way, it sounded like someone was screaming at her in return, simply in charged clusters of chords instead of in words. Christine coughed, startled from her terror. That was when the music invaded. Deep, commanding, full of power and demand, the music encircled and ensnared, each rumbling descent of eighths and sixteenths resonated within her skull. An organ. The music was being played upon a pipe organ, the kind found in churches. Soon the music was all she could think, all comprehension, all awareness, stolen away.

Nothing else mattered.

At least until the music quieted to a hum and a Voice joined in sonorous harmony. Brutal screaming wrenched from the hallowed pipes of the proud instrument was soon replaced by a lullaby. Soothing. Gentle. Intoxicating. Christine did not hear the song, she experienced it.

_'…what Little Lotte loved most was when the Angel of Music sang songs in her head…'_

Could it be? Was it possible? Struggling at the cusp of sleep, Christine listened to the lingering echoes of her favorite story being told by her Papa. Of Little Lotte and her Angel of Music. The melody resonating in her head soon pulled tired lids shut and slowed frightened ponderings.

The Angel of Music was here. He had stolen her away and brought her to his home, to sweet music's throne. Papa had kept his promise. At peace for the moment, Christine slept.

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Two yellow stars.

Christine awoke the second time sore, hungry and with two yellow stars gleaming down upon her in the dark. It took a few weary blinks to realize those stars were eyes. What kind of person had the luminescent eyes of a cat? Gripping the bedclothes, she pulled the fabric to her nose, stifling a cry threatening to pop her lungs like a soap bubble.

The stars winked in the shadows before retreating.

"Wait!" Christine pleaded, her voice splitting the quiet into glassy fragments. "W-who are you? Where am I? Why is it so dark? Papa! I-I need to see my Pa—"

"Silence!" the owner of the yellow stars hissed in a menacing whisper. It was a man. A frightening one. "Cease with your inane prattling, it is tedious and almost as bothersome as your incessant screaming."

Christine whimpered.

The yellow stars ceased to glitter, leaving her alone in the shadows, with only her Papa's stories and memories of haunting music keeping her mind at ease.

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Time passed. Hours. Long, dreary hours, during which Christine remained huddled in the plush comfort of the bed, adjusting to the dark, half-dreaming about yellow stars and promised angels. If those eyes and that voice belonged to the same man whom created such overwhelming music, then he could be little else other than an angel, and that meant this place of dark was his domain. But what angel would live in shadow? Had he stricken her of sight to hide from her a world of heavenly beauty beyond mortal compare?

She rubbed her eyes, discontent swirling in her gut, tears prickling at the corners of her eyes.

Her Angel was cruel. He abandoned her to this darkness, tormented as well as soothed her with song, and refused to allow her to speak. Christine worried about her Papa. Who would bury him? Would God take away the Angel of Music if she was not a good daughter who mourned and prayed upon his grave as a good catholic girl should? Or was this her punishment being dealt out for her failure?

Christine shivered—helpless in the stagnant dark.

That was when she heard it, a siren; voices followed, starting with a loathsome snarl.

"DAROGA!"

"…you done? Are you listening…the girl…where…" It was a male voice, different from the man with the stars for eyes. She could scarcely understand half the words being spoken due to his thick, foreign accent. "Erik! Put me down, I—" He began to gasp, his raised voice suddenly a gurgle. There was a loud thump, and a deep mumble of hushed tones. Coughing ensued and a throat was cleared. "Very well… leave…back soon…"

Shuffling feet and low muttering echoed around Christine. Obviously she was not alone in this dark realm with the frightening angel and his fearsome music.

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She was not sure when, but somewhere between hazy moments of sleep and awareness, candles were lit, illuminating the chamber she was in. Beautiful white furniture with gilded accents adorned the room and heavy curtains and tapestries covered the walls. Looking over the edge of the wide swan bed, Christine could see thick sheepskin rugs. In all, the room was ornate yet utterly feminine, as if commissioned by a lady of nobility for a manor home.

Slipping free of the blankets, now that she could see, Christine hesitantly dropped to the floor and began to explore. A wardrobe and matching chest of drawers sat opposite of the bed with a delicate paper folding screen painted with exotic flowers resting nearby. A lady's vanity with a complete _toilet_, a stool and mirror occupied the wall across from the door. After crawling onto the stool to examine the various bottles, brushes and clips, Christine focused on said aforementioned door which laid ajar.

Plucking briefly at the sleeve of her woolen nightgown, which hung to cover her bare feet, Christine found the courage to creep towards the door and nudge it open. Seeing naught but the glow of candles, she stepped out, startled by the chill of the floor. Soon she found long rug, a bright splash of crimson against the otherwise dreary grey of the hallway. Quietly, Christine continued to move, swiftly finding a corner to turn and peek around. What she saw made her gasp.

It was a massive chamber blooming with candlelight, a pipe organ consuming a far wall with other instruments sitting nearby like an orchestra at rest. Tables covered in paper and bookshelves swelling with countless tomes filled the gargantuan space alongside strange contraptions and models of buildings. Christine had thought the Opera House to be grandiose, but this…this was beyond comprehension. Eyes wide, she stumbled through the room, admiring every strange device and decoration. Like the room she woke up in, the floor and walls that were not otherwise filled, were covered in rugs and tapestries. Between a pair of bookshelves, she spied what appeared to be a fireplace, with a mantle covered in scary insect figurines and a pair of dusty armchairs huddled in front of it.

No fire burned despite the chill saturating the air.

Christine quickly realized how cold it was and began to tremble, desperately wishing for shoes and a coat.

"You are chilled."

With a squeak, Christine turned to face the voice she heard, but saw no one. She looked all around. Still, she could see no speaker. No yellow stars. It was as if the words were being spoken straight into her head.

"Be at ease, child, no harm will come to you here."

"Where am I? Where are you? W-who are you?"

"None of those things are important," he said. "All you need to know is that you are here to create music. Beautiful music. The kind which will bring crowds to their knees, weeping in joy and admiration of the fine instrument residing in your throat. Indeed, one day you shall be prima donna, should you devote your life to music! To me and my teachings."

The Voice—the Angel with the yellow stars for eyes—thought she could one day be a diva? Just as he Papa promised… Fear and joy intermixed with confusion.

"Why me? Why now? My Papa…he…"

"Do not worry about your father. His body shall be tended with care should you accept my tutelage," the Voice crooned. "I can give you everything, all that your father promised you, Christine, and more. All you have to do is promise to do all that I ask of you, to devote yourself to the gift which burns within us both, to swear yourself to me and my world. I will take care of you. You shall be sheltered, fed, your voice nurtured into perfection. What do you say, Christine?"

"I-I…I don't know," Christine could not hold back a whimper. She was just eight years old. What if the Angel abandoned her for not being good enough? Her Papa did promise that she would always be taken care of, that as long as she had music that all would be well.

The Voice began to hum gently, then sing, the words of his song familiar, a taste of home. It was a Swedish folk song, one Gustav sang off-key while plucking away at his violin when he wanted to chase away Christine's gloomy mood. He was a brilliant musician, her father, but it was from her mother Christine inherited her gift of song. Papa always told her she would sing Soprano in the Opera one day, just like her Mama. Her destiny was center stage.

_'Little Lotte, people from all over the country will come to listen to you sing.'_

"Your father promised you the Angel of Music, did he not?"

Christine nodded, her breath caught in her throat.

"Then trust your Angel, Christine. Swear yourself to me. Devote your heart and soul to music."

"Y-yes. I-I'll do it. For Papa."

"Good girl. Now, you must be exhausted. Why don't you return to your room and sleep?"

"I-I'm hungry, Angel." Christine said in a small voice as she dropped her eyes to the floor. "I couldn't possibly sleep. I-I'm sorry if I'm asking too much…"

The Voice took a long moment before responding, "Ask and I shall provide. Know this now, Christine. You will want for naught while under my care."

"Yes, Angel."

"Go to bed. Your Angel will bring you sustenance shortly."

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Lessons began after two small meals of bread, salted meat and cheese, and another long period of feverish sleep. At first, there was no singing. Just breathing. The Angel with the stars for eyes did not show himself as he instructed Christine on posture and technique. She was glad for this. Had he been in the room, physical and seen, she might not have survived his wrath. He possessed a loathsome temper and would yell insults at her until she ran away crying if she made too many mistakes or uttered a complaint. Within a fortnight, she must have hidden in her room nine times, cowering from the fury of the unseen angel whose Voice filled her head.

"Stupid girl, are you even paying attention? Is this a game to you?" he would say after his scolding, before roaring at her to leave. "GET OUT. OUT OF MY SIGHT!"

Then the whole house, if one could call the dark labyrinth they resided within a house, filled with terrible music. Anger and anguish rattled the walls and wrenched a reciprocal cry from Christine's throat. It hurt. Her Angel's passionate fury was agony.

It was on one such night, where she stumbled upon the notes of a scale she had performed almost perfectly the lesson before, and the Angel began to chase her from the room with his words, that Christine crumbled a few steps away from the massive pipe organ at which she rehearsed. Her legs betrayed her, knees like pillars of feathers being blown apart. Christine's head spun and her stomach ached. Ever since she started lessons, food became difficult to eat due to her nervousness, and without the daylight nourishing her, she found herself often consumed by terrible sadness which made eating even more unappealing.

Sleeplessness soon followed.

"Christine," the Voice in her head actually sounded concerned. "are you injured, _mon ange_?"

She groaned, curling up on herself as she begged him to forgive her; that she did not mean to fail him. She was trying as hard as she could. She would do better.

Footsteps and the flutter of cloth quieted Christine's mutterings. Cracking one eye open, she saw a pair of black polished shoes, the hem of fine trousers and a long, velvet cape—the kind wealthy gentlemen wore. Wearily, she turned her head to peer up at the figured standing above her. Yellow stars gleamed down upon her from within the sockets of bone-white mask covering her Angel's face from hairline to upper-lip. There was something odd about the shape of his mouth, she noted absently when he knelt down beside her, and he was awful tall. The tallest, thinnest man she had ever seen. He was built like a sapling—all long, spindly limbs—but he carried himself with the nobility of an ancient, unmovable oak.

Clad in the austere clothes of a gentleman attending the Opera and an expressionless mask, the Angel of Music was a terrible sight to behold. Elegant, impressive and beautiful, but terrible all the same. Christine could feel his power washing through her like an ocean wave, and like the sea, she feared he could drown her with his presence alone.

Gloved hands with long, spidery fingers—pianist fingers—hesitantly traced her brow and throat before retreating, as if burnt. He flexed his hands before reaching out and touching her again, briefly, to pull a curl away from her tear-stained face.

"Is Christine unwell?" he said, his proud voice strained. "Did Erik hurt her with his temper? Erik is a monster but he doesn't mean to hurt Christine. He loves Christine. When she sings, Erik feels like a man instead of a beast."

Erik? Who was Erik?

The Angel gathered Christine into his arms, "Erik will get help for Christine. Yes, she will be happy again. Christine will be happy and stay with Erik. She won't leave him. Never, never. She will sing for Erik and one day, Erik will make her prima donna, and she will sing for the world. Everyone will hear Erik's masterpiece and know that even a monster can create beautiful things." They were soon in her room and he was laying her down on the bed. He was careful to pull the sheets over Christine, as if he was terrified of breaking her. Was this the same man who shattered her with his words? He was so willing to rip her apart, to frighten and threaten her when she faltered during her lessons, yet now, he seemed scared, as if touching her would be her death.

And why did he keep mentioning this Erik person?

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It was not long after he put her to bed that her Angel disappeared. Christine laid in the plush bed, dizzy and ill, blearily pondering the past couple weeks of her life. Absently, she realized she did not know what day it was, but given the number of meals she was served and the lessons she attended, she must have missed at least one Sunday. Would God forgive her for not attending Mass? She prayed every night, or what she believed to be night since it was when the third meal was served and she went to bed. Maybe that was enough. But she wanted to visit her Papa's grave and say goodbye. The Angel with the yellow stars for eyes did say he would take care of her father's burial should she dedicate herself to music. To be buried by an angel…what a blessing.

Even if that angel lived mostly in darkness and yelled too much.

"Stop dragging me Erik! I can walk…" Christine frowned. Where had she heard that voice before? It was male, deep and foreign, his French more heavily accented than hers. "In Allah's name, what is…" He slipped into a different language altogether, his words harsh and guttural, a sharp contrast to the fluid romance of Paris' native tongue. And there was that name again, Erik. Was there a third person silently standing at the heels of the Angel of Music and the man with the funny accent? Erik seemed quite violent with the odd sounding man, so why did they continue to meet?

As she lost herself in meandering contemplations, the door swung open, illuminating a strange man as he entered…or more accurately, was pushed. He stumbled across the threshold, and as he straightened, cast an annoyed glare back into the hallway. Even in the dim lighting, Christine could tell he was an older man of darker complexion. His hair was short and his beard was streaked with grey. As he proceeded to light more candles, obviously familiar with the composition of the room, she could see more and more defining features. His clothes were fine. His eyes were jade. His nose was crooked. And like the Angel, he radiated power and control belied by his physical appearance.

Christine pulled the bedclothes to her chin. Would he hurt her?

As the stranger finished lighting candles, he set aside the one he held in hand before drawing to the edge of the bed. Sympathy glowed in those jade eyes as he began to speak. "_Bonjourpetit._ My name is Nadir, and I wish to make you well again," he said as he gently pulled the blanket from Christine's hands. As he folded the sheet down to her waist, Nadir muttered almost too softly to hear, "I do not know why Erik asked for my assistance, he is quite capable of making a diagnosis and treating any ills with his potions."

He gently rested his palm to her brow, told her cough and asked if there was pain when he pressed his thumbs against her face. Nadir was swift in his assessment and concise with his questions. "What was the last thing you ate? How well are you sleeping? Have any bad dreams? Dizzy spells?" Christine answered as best as she could, occasionally prompting him to repeat a question or word because of his accent. Her own light grasp of the language sometimes proved a barrier, and without realizing it, she would fall into her native Swedish when French failed her. It was a slow, awkward exchange, but eventually, Nadir seemed content with what he knew.

"Sleep Christine. I will make sure Erik provides you with what you need to get better."

"Monsieur, can I ask you a question?"

Nadir tilted his head, "You may."

"Who is Erik?"

Those Jade eyes widened, "Erik is your…caretaker. Did he not tell you his name?"

"Are Erik and the Angel who wears a mask the same man?"

He nodded, though he looked distinctly paler than before. In a hushed voice he said, "Whatever you do, Christine, no matter what is said or what is done, never remove his mask. Bad things happen when people remove Erik's mask."

"I won't. I promise…He would get angry, wouldn't he? I am scared of him when he is angry. He yells so loudly."

"Christine, do you wish to leave?" Nadir asked, his expression somewhat odd. "I can take you away from here if you wish, far away from Erik."

Christine shook her head, "No. Then he would be sad. My Angel is already so sad and angry. I can hear it in his music. He needs me." She paused, taking in a small breath, "He says he loves me. It is terrible when you lose someone you love. The sadness never goes away."

"Quite profound for someone so young," Nadir said. He looked older than when he entered the room, as if mountains of sorrow rested between his shoulders. "Just remember, if you ever want to leave, I will help you."

Christine smiled and watched the strange man leave the room.

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The cure for her illness was food, sleep and sunshine. Her Angel—Erik—sounded rather pained when he explained her state of malnourishment. Lessons were cancelled indefinitely and if she wasn't sleeping, there were snacks she was supposed to be eating. Christine did not see him for a few days, but she heard his voice chiding her, demanding that she eat every bite of her meal. Despite her inability to see him, Erik was quite adept at noticing when she tried to hide food in the folds of her skirt.

Later in the week, after a failed attempt at hiding her half-eaten supper, Erik at last revealed himself again. He melted out of the shadows of the organ and stood agitatedly near the bench. Those yellow stars consumed her every movement. Christine could not maintain eye contact. Instead, she bowed her head timidly and did her best to finish the delicate pastry on her plate. She loved sweets, but eating so much after eating so little made her queasy and feeling those penetrating stars upon her made sugar turn to ash in her mouth.

Pushing around a few crumbs with her finger, Christine glanced up again to find Erik hovering nearby, one gloved hand tapping impatiently against his trouser clad thigh. Once again, he was dressed for the Opera, the cut of his attire expensive but severe. Christine wondered if he owned any clothes that were less formal. _Probably not,_ she thought. _Why would an Angel wear anything by the finest clothes? _The dresses he provided her were no less elaborate in design and quality than his suits. They were colorful affairs with flaring skirts and trailing ribbons, like the children of nobility wore rather than the modest dresses clumsily hand sewn by poor daughters of fiddlers.

It made her very uncomfortable at first to wear such beautiful things, but as time progressed, Christine quickly learned to love each new addition she discovered in her wardrobe. The pale pink gown she wore was a fashionable day dress and made her feel like a lady instead of a little girl…even if she had a terrible habit of tripping over the hem and was rapidly ruining it.

"Good morning, Angel," Christine greeted cheerily in an effort to break the silence. Erik stared at her for a while longer before nodding, in what she assumed was agreement. "Are we to have a lesson today?"

"Of sorts," he replied. "Have you ever ridden a horse?"

She shook her head.

Erik folded restless arms behind his back, and began to tap the toe of his left shoe. "Daroga said Christine needed to exercise in the sun and fresh air. Horse riding is a lady's sport, yes?" When Christine shrugged her shoulders noncommittally, he turned away from her and began to pace. "Music sustains me and there are times when I forget that you cannot live off of song alone. You need more than voice lessons, food and sleep. You need sunshine, friendship and a proper education. A Lady, as I have come to understand it, needs to know how to ride a horse. And to be a prima donna, you must first be a lady, not a child." Those yellow stars seemed rather mournful as he added softly, "It was never my intent to neglect you. Now, go change into something more appropriate for riding."

With a nod she did just that and when she returned, he extended his hand for Christine to take, and for the first time in weeks, led Christine into the world above. She had not realized it until then, but her Angel of Music lived on the banks of a lake deep underground—his home so full of heavenly wonder was built in the devil's domain. However, after emerging from labyrinth of night, Christine lost all inclination to question it, her eyes bright as they stood outside the Opera House in the fading glow of dusk.

Hand still curled around her Angel's, she smiled.

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"Angel?"

"Does Christine need something?"

"I want to see my Papa's grave."

"…very well."

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It was three months after Erik plucked her from her life in the world above that Christine at last saw where her father's body rested. Three months of mourning, lessons and growing up. The Angel of Music still raged at her when angry, but she no longer fled his raised voice. He often disappeared for days, only his voice keeping Christine company and guiding her through lessons. Music consumed her and when was exhausted from singing, Erik filled her head to burst with lectures on theory, art, language and culture. He even provided her with handwritten workbooks for Maths and demanded that she practice reading and writing in at least a half-dozen different languages. It was exhausting.

And on the days he allowed her for rest, he encouraged her to work on her stitching or would take her above to ride.

Her head would swim by the time she collapsed in bed to sleep and her fingers ached from writing. Christine often would think back to those two weeks where all she was to learn was music.

Yet she saw no reason to complain. Her Angel was taking care of her, and had agreed to allow her to visit her Papa on her rest day.

A young man named Jules drove the carriage to the cemetery. The Angel with the yellow stars for eyes apparently trusted him with her safe-keeping. Sitting alone in the hansom was disconcerting, but Christine knew better than to think that her Angel was far away. Comforted by this knowledge, she spent the ride and her time in the graveyard without fear in her heart. Erik would take care of her.

He would always take care of her.

Upon finding Papa's headstone, Christine knelt in prayer, ignoring the cold and wet seeping in through her clothing. A thin layer of frost draped the land in grey and crunched beneath even her meager weight.

"I miss you Papa," she said. "but the Angel of Music found me and is taking care of me. He is strict and strange and lives in the dark…sometimes he yells and the mask he wears is awful scary. But he is kind, and has promised that I'll be a prima donna one day. Every time I sing on stage, I'll sing for you." Tears burned at the corners of her eyes and after praying long and hard, a small whimper crept out, "I wish you were still here, Papa. Why did you leave me?"

A shadow fell across the headstone.

It was time to leave.

"I'll be back soon, I promise."

**-TBC-**

**A/N: **This story is complete and approximately 6 parts long. Updates will be determined on if I can find a beta. Thank you for reading, please review so I now how I'm doing! Feedback is important, even if it is a simply "I like" or "I don't like".


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **

**Here is part two of six! Thank you to everyone who reviewed. Feedback is very important to me.**

**CHAPTER WARNING: **Potential triggers involving assault. Descriptions brief and within rating parameters.

**Disclaimer: **I still own nothing...

**The Fiddler's Daughter**

**By Catsitta**

**.2.**

"NO, NO, NO! That is wrong, Christine! Have you forgotten how to breathe? Chin up. Oh save your theatrics for the stage, I have no time for weeping little girls."

"I hate you! You spiteful, horrible man!"

"Bah!"

Erik slammed his hands on the keys, filling the caverns with discordant noise. He was visibly seething, eyes flaring, hair wild and body tense. Christine watched the muscles in his jaw twitch as he ground his teeth to restrain from screaming like a madman. She crossed her arms and stuck her nose up defiantly. For six years she knew Erik and weathered his tempest of a temper. Yelling, pacing and throwing things had long since proved ineffective in cowing her, especially when she figured out he would never physically harm her, even while in a snit. The same could not be said for her possessions.

The last time she drove him into a sputtering fury, Erik smashed apart her favorite tea pot and flipped the dining table. Nadir had dropped by in the middle of that confrontation, setting off the siren purposefully a minute or so before he arrived on the lakeshore. Christine heard the alarm but Erik apparently hadn't, because he continued smashing things even when the Persian walked into the house.

"What is going on here?" Nadir exclaimed upon seeing the chaos.

Those golden stars burned wildly as they focused upon the intruding Persian. Like a jungle cat, Erik pounced, closing his hands around Nadir's throat. He shook the dark-skinned man, frightening Christine into a peal of screams. It was only her shrieks of terror that broke his fury and caused Erik to drop his prey.

Rubbing his throat, Nadir frowned at Erik and Christine, clearly peeved more by the broken pottery than his own state of abuse.

"Erik…"

"Daroga."

The evening ended with the Persian threatening to take Christine away and Erik yelling profanities at his retreating form. When Nadir disappeared from sight, the Angel of Music collapsed onto his knees and began to rock back-and-forth. Tears made his yellow eyes glassy beneath the shadows of the expressionless mask.

"No one will ever take Christine away from Erik!" he mewled. "Christine is Erik's masterpiece. She will sing on stage for him and him only. One day, all the world will hear Erik! Yes, yes. All the world has seen the beauty he can create, his buildings are without compare, but music is where Erik's soul lies. Beautiful, terrible music. How Erik burns!"

Christine knelt beside him, amongst the shattered remains of the table and teapot, and bid her angel to hush. She sang to him a soft lullaby and stroked his hands. Long ago she learned never to touch his neck or face, it seemed Erik had a fear of strangulation as well as unmasking. Christine never asked why he feared such things—she also never asked why he pretended to be an Angel. Oh yes, she knew he was a man, quite mortal and jaded, but he was also a genius. A lonely, broken genius who brightened every time she called him Angel and seemed to enjoy the game of pretending to be something bigger than life. She knew his tricks, how he could throw his voice and loved his trapdoors. Nadir had told her these things and more. But she allowed Erik to remain her supernatural guardian. No matter his flaws, no matter their fights, he was still her beloved Angel of Music.

"Christine, are you paying attention?"

Blinking away the memory, Christine turned her attention onto her glowering guardian. He was no longer pulsating rage and was absently plucking at his shirtsleeve. His tone was snappish, as it normally was during her lessons, and it was clear by his body language he wanted to forget their confrontation and lose himself in music.

She nodded.

Erik's fingers flew across the keys, and after four measures of masterful playing, Christine began to sing, her voice and his accompaniment fit to make even the real Angel of Music weep.

.

.

Standing at the tall doors of the Opera House, Christine prepared to enter the familiar marble halls. Six years ago she stayed here with her Papa and took ballet lessons with Madame Giry's daughter Meg. Six years ago, Gustav Daaé died in a small, vacant room in the company barracks. Six years ago, the Angel of Music stole her away in the night, and she had not spoken to the members of the Opera since. Of course she had seen them from afar, Erik was thorough in her education and hid her beside him in Box 5. She saw countless Operas, symphonies and ballets from behind the velvet curtains. When she was ten, Erik explained that they lived beneath the massive building, his house installed deep in the cellars when the Opera was built.

After all, he helped fund as well as construct the magnificent Palais Garnier, and due to that fact, he was also a majority owner of the Opera House. Haunting the halls as a "Ghost" was merely a form of amusement for him and allowed Erik to control the going ons of his Opera without revealing himself to the public.

Christine sighed at the thought. Was it fair for her to perform here if Erik owned the theater?

Knowing that she was dithering, Christine opened the grand doors and entered the lobby, feeling out of place surrounded by such ornate majesty. She was a simple Swedish soprano. Glitter and glamor were not in her blood nor desired. She felt rather plain even while garbed in the fine silks Erik provided. The managers would no doubt see a meek little girl with a mousy complexion.

She smoothed her skirts and whispered, "I have to do this, for Papa…for Erik…"

It did not take long to find where she needed to be. Following the signs and the sound of voices, Christine discovered the waiting room for those seeking auditions. Men and women filled the small space, most bedecked in fabulous gems and feathered finery. Some carried cases, others were rosining bows, some were stretching into impossible positions, and others were trilling like suffocating songbirds. Actors, dancers and musicians alike stood in wait for their number to be called.

Erik said he had arranged an audition for her earlier in the week and this morning, without warning, handed her sheet music with a number scrawled across the top.

Judging by the amount of people, the day was going to prove a long one.

.

.

When her number was hollered into the room, Christine shuffled from the corner she sequestered herself in and crept onto the stage. She could hear the snide comments and mocking snickers chasing her. _What a pitiful child_. _What is she doing here? Watch, she is going to faint on stage, her face is already white._

Reaching the center of the stage, Christine stared at the three people sitting in the house. The manager, whose name she could not recall, the conductor, Monsieur Ryer, and the ballet mistress, Madame Giry. None of them seemed too interested in her until the manager read aloud her name and the song she would be singing. Suddenly, three pairs of eyes were focused on her.

"Daaé…any relation of the violinist, Gustav Daaé?" asked Monsieur Ryer.

"Yes, he was my father."

"How is he?"

"I…he passed away six years ago, monsieur."

Madame Giry frowned, "Is that why you both disappeared from the Opera House without a word?" She obviously remembered the little girl who was fast friends with her daughter.

"He was ill…his death was quite sudden." Christine heard her voice crack. She did not want to talk about this right now. The trio seemed to acknowledge her distress and bid her to begin her audition.

At first, her nervousness and grief intermingled to clog her throat. She could hardly breathe, much less sing. A quivering squeak escaped her lips and the manager shook his head. When he looked ready to wave her away, Christine saw two yellow stars glittering from Box 5, and heard his voice in her ear. _'Sing for me and me alone, Christine. Sing for your Angel of Music!'_

Enraptured by his command, Christine stood tall and let her voice soar. Every fear, every pain, every desperate hour—she remembered her Papa's death, his cold, pale face, she remembered heated arguments with Erik, each shattered piece of furniture a victim of his want for perfection—Christine let it all fill her and take flight. Higher and higher her voice climbed. Louder and louder her Angel commanded for her to sing.

And then, there was silence.

Chest heaving, Christine gazed out over the house to find three gaping faces. Madame Giry composed herself first and cleared her throat. Monsieur Ryer and the manager regained the ability to blink shortly thereafter.

"Very good," the manager said. "We will contact you later. Yes? Yes. Now, uh, next performer!"

.

.

"Angel, why are my belongings packed in a trunk?"

"Members of the Opera often live in the barracks."

"You mean?"

"Congratulations Christine, you have made your Angel proud."

"Am I to live above now?"

"For the time being, yes. Do not fret, Christine, our lessons shall continue."

.

.

She was in the chorus. It was to be expected. Christine, for all her talents, was simply too young for a named role. Singing on stage at fourteen was a notable feat in itself; however, Erik did not seem to agree. During their above ground lessons in the small church adjoining the Opera, he took to complaining about the incompetence of his manager and how the man would not know a star if it fell from the heavens and landed upon his balding head.

Christine saw no reason to whine. She was seeing new things, meeting so many people! It was overwhelming at first, but now she felt at ease amongst the chaos. Not even Carlotta's diva antics could darken her spirits.

Come the evening before her first performance, the Opera being performed an Italian affair she could never pronounce the name of correctly, Erik at last silenced his grumblings to offer praise. Mere minutes before Christine needed to run off to costumes, she entered the chapel and soaked in the gentle tones of her angel.

"Can I see you?" she asked. "It would make me less nervous if I could see you again. It feels like forever since we last spoke face-to-face."

From the shadows, two yellow stars emerged. Christine grinned. They exchanged pointless pleasantries, a rarity given Erik's dislike of casual yammering, and right before she dashed off to prepare for the show, Erik grabbed her wrist.

"A token," he said as he slipped something cool around the middle finger of her left hand. "Wear this always, Christine, so that I will know you sing for me and that your heart is dedicated to music. Remember, as long as you swear yourself to music, all you need shall be provided, and all you desire shall one day come to fruition. Swear it, Christine. Swear that you belong to music."

"I swear, Angel."

Erik released her and stepped backwards into the shadows, leaving Christine alone in the chapel, surrounded by stained-glass and weeping stone angels, a simple gold ring adorning her hand. She stared at it. Why would he give her a ring?

Footsteps startled her and brought her attention to the door of the church.

"There you are Christine!" It was Meg Giry, her once again friend and companion. The dancer was a flurry of blonde curls as she bounced over to Christine. "Have you been here all this time? Oh, you are going to be late and mother is so temperamental when anyone is late." The petite girl began to push Christine towards the door with ease, her tiny frame nothing but muscle.

As they began to head towards the dressing rooms, Meg pursed her lips and glanced up. "Christine, who were you talking to?" she asked.

"The Angel of Music," Christine replied.

"Oh…" Meg's expression made it clear that she did not understand. "Everyone has their rituals before a show. If all you do is pray to the Angel of Music, then you are quite sane compare to some of the others. There are rumors—."

The pair lost themselves in gossip, Christine's odd behavior dismissed and the ring on her finger forgotten.

.

.

It was just a little kiss that started all the problems. The stagehands often flirted with the ballerinas, and on occasion, would dare each other to steal a kiss from one of the girls. Christine did not know of the game until too late. The ballet rats she was sitting with scampered off in a spatter of giggles, leaving poor Christine as the victim. She stood to follow, only to have someone tap on her shoulder and plant a kiss on her mouth when she turned around. It was the dry pressing of chapped lips, and no sooner did their mouths touch did the boy lean back and smile.

He was older than her by a couple years, tall but otherwise nondescript. His sleeves were pushed up to revealed muscled arms, and there was a streak of dirt on his left cheek. With a wink, he ruffled her hair and ambled back to his fellow stagehands, smug in his success. Meg hurried to her side afterwards and tugged a lock of Christine's long, riotous curls.

"At least it was Henry who kissed you instead of Burquet."

Christine frowned, "Isn't Burquet the fly man?" When Meg nodded, she shuddered. "The way he looks at us while we're in rehearsal make me nervous. He sometimes licks his lips and tries to grab girls when they walk past him."

The pair shivered together in agreement, then Meg grinned like a cat with a secret, "Was it nice?"

"Was what nice?"

"The kiss!"

"Oh…it was…odd. If kissing is always like that, then I don't think I'll like it very much." Christine sighed as she continued, "Good girls do not kiss men outside of marriage. Does Henry kissing me make me a…" She faltered and looked helplessly at her friend. The blonde shook her head.

"No, no. Kissing is very nice with the right man, and never wrong, even if that man isn't your husband. No matter what some of the stuffy ladies and men might say. All this proper etiquette nonsense does not apply here in the Opera." She thrust a bare leg in the air for emphasis. "Being a lady, all proper and shy will only hurt an actor's career. We show skin, act out scandals and of course, start a few scandals of our own. Speaking of which, you would not believe what, or I should say who, La Sorelli, is doing…"

With a gasp and a blush, Christine listened avidly as Meg shared some of the most lurid gossip she had ever heard. Women were doing _what_ with _who_? Men put their _what_ _where_? She knew she was as red as Erik's favorite ink by the time they parted ways. The last time she felt this flushed, she'd started her monthly for the first time and had gone running to Erik in tears. Her Angel had been playing the violin, a sprawl of handwritten music at his feet, when she leapt onto his lap screaming about how she was dying. An hour and a great deal of sputtering later, Erik had explained that the bleeding meant she was a woman and promptly pulled a book from a shelf to describe the biology of the phenomena.

Neither of them was able to look the other in the eye for a week.

Wandering idly through the Opera House, thinking about kisses and _things_, the last thing Christine expected was to be grabbed from behind, one hand clapped over her mouth. Instinctively, she began to scream and struggle, her feet lashing out as she tried to kick her attacker's knees or groin, just as Erik taught her to do before he released her to the world above. Her assailant seemed prepared for this and maneuvered her in such a way that she could not land a blow.

Suddenly, she was being thrust into a dark room, the door slamming shut with a bone-jarring BANG. Her attacker shoved her into a wall, causing Christine to cry out, but her screams were cut short by the hand returning to her mouth. Desperate, she bit down and tasted leather, only to have her head knocked back against the wall when he jerked his hand away. The blow dazed her and she went limp.

Who was doing this? Why was he doing this?

Frightened and confused, she glanced up, the taste of blood thick in her mouth. Two yellow stars pierced the darkness.

"W-what? Why are you hurting me?" Christine's voice was small, "You said you would never hurt me."

"Erik would never hurt Christine, but oh, Christine drove him to it. He loves Christine, but Erik is a monster, a poor, pitiful monster who believed Christine when she said she belonged to him and his music. Then Christine betrayed him!" His face drew closer with every word until she could see his bone-white mask despite the dark. He only referred to himself like a separate person when he was mindless with emotion. Erik's hands gripped her shoulders and he shook her roughly, like a child might a doll. "Why did Christine have to betray Erik by kissing that _boy_? She makes Erik want to do terrible things when she hurts him like this. Erik wants to wrap his hands around the boy's throat, to squeeze it until the whelp turns blue, then snap his insolent neck! Erik wants to wrap a noose around his neck and fling him from the catwalk, to watch him dangle as the audience screams. Erik wants to kill! Erik is a monster, but with Christine, he thought he was changed, that he could be gentle as a lamb for her. And he can, yes he can, but not when she acts like a harlot!"

It was a slap, his senseless words, and Christine could not help but cry. Why was he saying such horrible things? "You think I'm a h-harlot because a boy kissed me?" she closed her eyes and began to weep loudly. No matter what she did, Erik never said cruel things or touched her in violence. On occasion, he called her a stupid or impudent girl, but the venom behind those words faded over the years until they were said with almost begrudging affection.

"Shut up, Christine! Shut up and look at Erik," he demanded. When she continued to cry, Erik shook her more harshly, his voice rising higher in volume, "LOOK AT ERIK!" Her lids reluctantly peeled open and she met those yellow stars fearfully. She could feel his breath against her face, those strange, misshapen lips of his a hair span away from her chin as he stared wildly down at her. One of his hands lifted to stroke her cheek and his voice became eerily gentle as he said, "Good girl. Christine is a good girl. Even good girls make mistakes…Christine is only human. Yes. Christine belongs to music; she promised Erik that she would devote herself to him. Christine, is Erik still your Angel? Please say that this pitiful monster is still your Angel of Music. "

Christine nodded. What other answer could she offer? Erik had her pinned to a wall. He could hurt her far worse than a broken lip and a bump on the head if she upset him further. And, despite his actions, he was still her guardian, her Angel. She loved him. What child, stricken by grief and isolated from all other human contact, would not hold an attachment to their only companion? Thus she forgave his accusations and his abuse with a nod of her head and a mumbled, "You will always be my Angel."

"Good girl. Christine is a good girl."

She did not resist when Erik gathered her up in his arms and held her close. Physical affection was not common. Affection in general was rarely apparent when offered by her Angel. A pulled curl or stroked hand was as rare as curt praise about an aria well sung or a pot of tea well brewed. To be held by him, the embrace initiated by Erik, was a new thing. If only the moment was not overshadowed by his slip into insanity.

When he at last released her, Erik caught Christine's left hand and lifted it to his mouth. He kissed the ring resting on her third finger almost reverently before guiding her into the shadows. Trapdoors and darkened passageways led to his underground home, and there, he tended her wounds. Christine fell asleep in her childhood bed and woke in the barracks.

As she blinked away the last vestiges of sleep, Christine's heart ached with the knowledge that her relationship with the Angel of Music was forever changed by a kiss and a misunderstanding.

.

.

Life in the Opera left little time to mope and worry wounds until they festered. Christine embraced the colorful chaos of the stage. After the incident where Erik drew blood, Erik did not demand she attend lessons or visit her before shows; she was on her own for the first time, and it was…lonely. She was relieved by the lack of contact for a few weeks, but when her Angel's silence faded into months, Christine began to feel uneasy. Rehearsals kept her from investigating or even lingering on the fact, but as the season drew to a close, she found more time to miss her once constant companion.

Meg often commented on her state of distraction and Madame Giry had taken to staring at her with a furrowed brow. Twice she saw Nadir in passing, but the Persian man always disappeared before she could catch him. If only she knew how to enter and navigate the labyrinth on her own. Erik never allowed her to know the secrets behind his tricks and insisted that she never come or go from his house without his help because of the many traps he set for unwitting intruders.

It was during one of her long bouts of contemplation, Madame Giry walked up behind Christine, and proceeded to startle her back into reality with a rap of her cane against the wooden floorboards. Christine jerked her head around to look at the ballet mistress, and noticed that they were alone in the middle of the stage—when had the others left? She frowned with confusion. Madame Giry cleared her throat.

"Am I needed for something, Madame?"

The austere woman stared down her long nose like a hawk, her tightly bound hair and black clothing adding to the severity the _look_. She adjusted thin hands on the top of the cane and pinched thin lips together in an entirely disapproving manner. What had Christine done to upset her? She could not recall doing or saying anything offensive, even in the conservative perspective of Meg's strict mother.

"Do you know what you are meddling with, Christine? He is not the kind of man whose attention anyone, much less a girl of your…demeanor, would want upon her." Madame Giry reached into her sleeve and pulled a crisp envelope from within. A blood-red seal in the shape of a skull marked one side, and the other had Christine's name written upon it familiar, childish scrawl. "Why would the Opera Ghost send you a letter?"

"I do not know…"

"Ha! Do not think me a fool. I've been delivering letters for him almost twenty years. Never once has he sent a letter directly to one of the performers." Madame Giry's scowl faded into an expression that would almost qualify as maternal. "Please tell me what you know of him." When Christine began to shake her head, the ballet mistress strode forwards until she hovered a breath away, her eyes and voice filled with urgency. "I have heard your conversations and your rehearsals…I know they stopped after you received those bruises you refuse to speak about. Christine, he is dangerous. He is a…well, he is no angel."

Christine glanced away, determined not to say a word. She knew of the Opera Ghost's antics. Erik was the Angel of Music, the Phantom of the Opera and a mere mortal genius. He was a man with many names and many masks, and despite their falling out, she still cared deeply for him. Was he taking care of himself? Did he play terrible music all hours of the night? He often neglected his health, as if music and passion alone could sustain him. The poor man was all bones! Without her presence, Christine was certain he was in even worse shape.

"Christine?" She held out one hand, pointedly refusing to look at the ballet mistress. When the meager weight of the letter rested on her open palm, Christine heard Madame Giry murmur, "I wish you would tell me what you know. I cannot protect you if I do not know what I am facing."

"He won't hurt me, Madame. Despite what you think, he is a good man."

"Erik is a great man. A genius. But that makes him no less dangerous."

Surprised to hear her Angel's name, Christine turned, "You know his name?"

"I know a little about him. His name, his wit, his passion for the arts…as well as his temper. I have seen him on occasion Christine, earned a modicum of his respect and he…he saved my life once. If not for him, Meg would not be here today." Madame Giry shuddered, as if holding back tears. "I saw a very powerful and deadly man that day, and I learned that he is not a force to be trifled with nor mocked. He could easily bring the Opera House down around our ears if he willed it. This is why I need to know what your involvement with him is; what you know of him. Cross him wrong and you could easily end up…" She allowed her words to trail off before hesitatingly continuing, "Has he, has he tried to seduce you? Touched you?"

"Goodness no! He would never—."

"—strike you?" Christine touched her cheek. "He is a man of great and terrible passion."

"I know."

"What is your involvement with him? I need to know. Is he your teacher? Your friend?"

"That and so much more. He…he is my guardian, Madame. He took care of me when Papa passed away." Christine said, not sure what to think of the horrified pallor the ballet mistress wore. "I have said too much. Trust that he wishes me no harm, Madame. And if he does, then it is too late to save me."

As she scampered into the wings, Christine heard the ballet mistress's final, whispered words.

"God protect us all."

.

.

Meg found Christine in the barracks a few hours later, curled up and sobbing, shreds of paper surrounding her. The blonde picked up a few of the pieces, only to drop them with a gasp when she saw the thick, wax seal clinging to one.

"Did you receive a note from…from _him_?" Meg asked. She grew up in the Opera House, amongst the gossip and the torrid tales. The legendary ghost seemed to rile her naturally superstitious nature into a frenzy, and the normally cheerful girl turned into a fearful, mousy wreck. "Oh, did he threaten you? Goodness…"

Unable to speak, Christine merely shook her head and gulped in a few, shaky breaths. The letter was not a threat. It was a message promising that Christine would be safe. The Angel of Music would watch over and protect her as he promised, as long as she kept her own vow to be dedicated to music alone. She would never want for anything…but to protect her, Erik would no longer openly consort with her. No more music lessons. No more tea. No more anything! He would leave her lesson plans and books where she could find them, but he would not whisper in her ear any longer.

'_It is time for the Angel of Music to return to heaven,' _the letter proclaimed. _'Try not to forget your teacher.'_

Meg wrapped her arms around Christine and the young soprano wept against the ballerina's shoulder long into the night.

**-tbc-**

**A/N: ( Thank you for reading, please review! Feedback is crucial for a writer, even if it is a simple "I like" or "I dislike". )**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: **Part three of six.

The chapter in which the story as we know it begins...

**Chapter warning(s): **Possible trigger warning for assault. Within parameters of rating but more intense than last chapter. Also, take in consideration that the opinions displayed by the characters do not necessarily reflect that of the author.

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**The Fiddler's Daughter**

**By Catsitta**

**.3.**

"Little Lotte, where is your red scarf? You could not have possibly lost it after I rescued it from the sea."

Christine smiled as she turned to face the young man approaching her backstage after a successful rehearsal. Meg stood wide-eyed and twittering nearby, clearly enthralled by the possibility that the handsome patron knew her friend. The years were kind to the Vicomte de Chaney. He was blond, blue-eyed, and rich—the second son of a manner house with a destiny paved in golden bricks. She was still the plain, orphaned daughter of a poor violinist, her fortune hopefully to be found at center stage. Christine had secured a named role as Marguerite, and it was her crowning accomplishment thus far. No longer were they children playing by the ocean, but a rising star soprano of almost sixteen and a military destined son of nobility of eighteen. In their new roles of burgeoning adulthood, their places in society were laid clear.

However, both of them tossed aside rank for a brief moment as they remembered those brief days on the seaside so long ago.

"Raoul, how good to see you."

"Christine, it is my pleasure. It has been too long, we must speak! Come along, let us have lunch."

"I-I, I can't…"

"Oh nonsense, you change, let me fetch my hat. Fifteen minutes, Little Lotte!"

As Raoul ambled away, Christine clutched a hand to her breast and let out a shuddering sigh. They were not children anymore. He was a nobleman and she an actress, to consort outside of the Opera House would be…quite the scandal.

"You know the Vicomte?" Meg asked in a breathy voice as she fanned herself with one hand.

"We played together as children. We…we are little more than strangers now."

"He obviously doesn't think of it that way. To think, a Vicomte!" She giggled. "Maybe he will sweep you away to his mansion and make you his Vicomtess."

"Don't be ridiculous Meg!"

The blonde winked, "Remember, we're not like those high society ladies. Our careers depend on a little scandal." She struck a saucy pose and grinned, "Do you think he'll try to bed you?"

"MEG!"

Head thrown back with laughter, Meg pranced away a few steps.

"Oh don't be a prude. Come, we need to dress up for your lunch with the Vicomte."

"We?"

"Mother would kill me if I let you wander off with an unmarried man unescorted. She thinks of you like another daughter."

The pair walked together to the dressing rooms, quietly chattering as young girls are wont to do.

.

.

It was the affair of the season. Ladies of all class and creed were aghast at the behavior of the young Vicomte. Why would he traipse around with a theater trollop? Did he not know that an Opera singer was a fine mistress to keep and bed, but to parade around with her at functions as if she was one of them was utterly uncouth! Many knew of the de Chaney's taste in bedmates—almost every generation of their men took actresses as lovers. Phillipe had been entertaining the Prima Ballerina La Sorelli for a couple years, but he never dared to take her into public on his arm.

Christine heard the rumors and the malicious whispers and did her best to keep her chin high. She was not Raoul's mistress, she was his friend. Him escorting her to a dinner now and then did not make her a _whore_. They had never even kissed!

It was overwhelming to be at the center of so much negative attention and soon she began to lose focus, her appetite and sleep. She sang flawlessly, it would be an insult to Erik and his teachings for her to do any less, but Christine cringed inwardly at her own lack of soul. When had the passion puttered out? Her songs were crystalline, but shallow. The once fathomless depths of emotion rang hollow.

The audience clapped.

Monsieur Ryer offered nothing but praise.

Carlotta called her a tramp and said she sang like a toad.

No one but her seemed to notice the death of her soul. The death of her music.

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.

"Marry me, Christine. We can run away to the country, leave all the gossip mongers behind…in a few months we can come back and our relationship will be old news."

"I-I…I don't know what to say."

"Say yes! With your father gone, you need someone to take care of you. A husband who can support and cherish you."

"M-my patron, I told you of him, the man who sponsored me when Papa died…I am not sure he would approve of me marrying. He said that as long as I dedicated myself to music, he would take care of me. If we marry…"

"When we marry you will no longer need to sing. Come now, you're a smart girl. Your patron will be happy to have you off his hands and married. It is a good match. He could not possibly have any complaints about us."

"G-give me some time to think, Raoul, and to ask for his blessing. Please?"

"Anything for you, my love."

.

.

Marriage? How could he contemplate marriage only weeks after they met? True, they knew each other as children, and he was kind, patient and wealthy. He would make a good husband and was everything Papa would have wanted for her save for one thing. With Raoul, there was no music. Ever since Erik abandoned her, it was hard to keep the passion burning, but now, there wasn't even a spark. Raoul was consuming her, same as Erik did for years, but instead of stoking the flames of song which sustaining her, he smothered them. Could she live without music?

A husband and children would certainly fill the void, she supposed. Especially children. She fantasized a large family for years and now was her chance to have one. Christine began to smile at the thought. A baby. They were young, too young some might say, but she would not protest to having a child.

Lost in her daydreams, Christine began to walk to the small chapel adjoining the Opera House. The Angel with the yellow stars for eyes said he would be watching her, even if he did not respond to her prayers. He had not responded in over a year. She doubted her pronouncement would cause that to change. Once she reached the chapel, Christine knelt and began to speak. In her ramblings, she found resolution. She would marry Raoul. It was a good match and unlikely she would find better.

"Thank you for all you have given me, Angel," she said as she rose to her feet. Carefully, Christine pulled off her gloves and then the golden band from her left hand. She admired it for a moment before placing the ring on the altar. "I think this is goodbye."

No voice whispered in her ear. No man emerged from the shadows. No song rang in her heart.

Christine turned on her heel and began to replace her gloves.

A hand closed over her mouth.

Warm breath brushed her neck as a familiar voice hissed in her ear, "'ello luv. Wanderin' about alone again to talk to angels, eh?" Christine struggled against Joseph Burquet's hold. The fly man was a lewd creature, always undressing the girls with his eyes as he horrified them with his tales of the Opera Ghost. _Skin like old parchment_, he would growl, _a gaping hole where there should be a nose_. "I heard you are plannin' on marryin' the Vicomte. You must be a good fuck if a titled gent wants sole rights to bedding you. How about givin' ol Joseph here a taste of the goods, hm?"

Screaming against the dirty hand on her mouth, Christine slammed a heel onto the top of Burquet's foot and attempted to elbow him in the ribs, but the man was wearing thick boots and seemed more amused than injured by her strikes. He chuckled and flexed the muscled arm he had looped around Christine's corseted waist. She stilled, unable to breathe.

"Now, keep quiet or I'll gag you," he said, removing the hand he had over her mouth to adjust the front of his pants. Christine gasped in shallowly, her lungs trapped by the whale bone fasteners of her corset. "Good girl." She felt tears sting her eyes as she was pushed into a wall and a hand thrust under her skirts. No one ever touched her there before. Good God, what was he doing? She could feel him tugging on her pantaloons.

A weak scream tore through her throat.

Burquet grunted and slapped her, "Shut up, wench. I'm not doin' nothin' countless others haven't done to you. Don't act like your some saint." His hand went back under her skirts. She began to gag on fear as well as the stench of alcohol and body odor emanating off of her attacker. Christine bucked against him, his grip tightened and her vision blurred. He forced her against the wall again, this time knocking her head against it. His hand touched virgin skin and places Madame Giry explained should never be touched except by one's husband.

There was blood in her mouth.

She heard fabric rip.

Everything was starting to grow dark.

Why was there pain? Why was he putting his finger there? It hurt! Christine tried to scream and struggle, but Burquet held her tight, kept her pinned to the wall. She teetered on the edge of unconsciousness. She closed her eyes. He kept touching her. It still hurt. He muttered something profane and shifted behind her.

Then, he was gone.

Christine inhaled deeply as she collapsed to her knees on the ground. She heard strange noises, as if someone were…choking? Morbidly curious, she peeked through lowered lids to see Burquet writhing against an unseen force, his hands grasping at his throat. He turned red, then purple, then blue, his eyes bulging, his neck swollen. Then, a gruesome SNAP filled the chapel and Burquet fell in a heap.

She stared at him, his body sprawled, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle, lifeless and unmoving. A scream swelled in her throat. Christine swallowed, too frighten to even squeak.

A shadow fell over her. The fear numbed, chilling each pulse with calm, leaving her in a partial stupor.

"Angel," Christine breathed.

Yellow stars gleamed from above.

"Christine broke her promise to her Angel of Music," Erik said in a monotone voice. "Look what she made Erik do. He deserved to die, but Erik has not killed in years. Christine's unfaithfulness drove him to this."

"I-I was not unfaithful! Burquet tried to…to…"

"He tried to rape, Christine. He would have never tried to hurt Christine if she was not dallying about with that fop." She winced at the accusation. Was he implying she had done something to deserve this abuse? "Oh, he was a bad man and Erik thought Christine was a good girl. He let Christine have her freedom. Daroga insisted for years that Erik release Christine from his domain. Look what happened when he did. Christine involved herself with an imbecile; traded her soul for foolish notions of love and forced Erik to kill again. Stupid girl. Christine is a stupid, stupid girl."

Erik scowled at her from behind his mask, and after a few seconds of assessment, he lunged forwards and grabbed her arm, pulling Christine roughly to her feet. He stared at her briefly before gripping Christine's hand and jamming something onto her finger. The golden band glittered once again where Raoul offered to put an engagement ring.

"Obviously, Christine cannot be trusted. Erik thought she wanted to be a diva and was devoted to music alone. But no, she threw it away for the fop. A boy who tried to lure Christine into his bed with promises of marriage. The Vicomte could never marry an actress. At best, Christine would become his mistress, a kept woman, until he grew bored and cast her out, ruined."

"Raoul loves me."

A dark sound emerged from behind the mask, a warped parody of laughter, "The boy lusts over Christine. He promises marriage to bed Christine; he fills her foolish head with fantasies of running away, but doesn't tell her that he is leaving in a month. He is to be at sea for a year. Ah, Erik sees Christine is surprised by this. Stupid girl should keep her promises to her Angel, he is the only one who truly loves her. Erik took Christine in when her father died. Erik fed, clothed and educated Christine. True, he hurt her on occasion because Erik is a monster, but Christine should be more grateful. Instead she lies to Erik and tries to run off with a boy when she is sworn to Erik."

He sighed. Normally, Erik would be in a terrible rage at a moment like this. He would yell at and demean her with his venomous tongue and scald her with his fury. Instead, he was eerily calm. With gentleness she was grateful for, Erik embraced Christine and began to stroke her curls.

"Does Christine still love her Angel?"

"Yes."

"Does Christine trust her Angel to do what is best for her?"

Christine nodded. Despite his terrible temper, he did try to do all he could for her.

"On Christine's sixteenth birthday, Erik will have a surprise for her. Will Christine come with her Angel and do as she is told, no questions asked? If she does, Erik will no longer worry about Christine breaking her promises if she does. He will trust her again."

Once again, she nodded. Erik was a strange man. He likely wanted to have her sing with him again. It had been almost two years since they lived in the labyrinth together and thrived on song. Christine felt her heart flutter at the prospect. Beautiful, terrible music. Consuming and mind altering. Erik could control her every thought and feeling with the properly struck chord. Returning to him and his world of night would not be a chore—the company of normal people was overwhelming and tiresome, and sometimes, the sun made Christine's head ache.

"We will resume our lessons," Erik announced, freeing Christine from her wandering thoughts. "You have been without my tutelage too long and it shows. Your posture is slacking, your pitch is flat and for god's sake you sound dead. When you were a child you sang with more passion." She smiled at the odd pull of his lips as she imagined the disgusted expression he wore beneath the mask. It was good when Erik spoke this way; it meant he was relatively calm and reasonable. "We have a fortnight before your birthday. Let us see what damage we can repair in that time. Your voice is what the commoner thinks _good_ but I taught you to be the best, the state of your singing is abysmal compared to what it should be."

"I submit myself to your wisdom and teachings, _Maestro_."

If Erik noticed the mocking lilt to her voice, he did not comment on it. Instead, he released Christine from his embrace to scowl at the ground. Or more likely, what laid on the ground. She knew she should be more disturbed by the way Erik manipulated the corpse with a few easy twists of his wrists, like a master ventriloquist plucking the strings of a human-sized marionette. She knew she should have run away screaming to the authorities instead of watching impassively as Erik strung his victim from the rafters.

She knew, but logic failed where the heart reigned.

Erik was a dangerous, volatile man with a checkered past. His metal state was unstable, and his health questionable, for he was little more than a skeleton beneath those fine clothes he wore if the brief glimpses of his neck and wrists were anything to gauge by. There was no doubt Erik was a genius even if he liked to play ghost for a superstitious theater and angel for a fatherless girl. Beneath all the idiosyncrasies, most of which were definitively childish in nature like pulling tricks or throwing fits, and the anger he instinctively reacted with when uncomfortable, he was a good man. A brilliant, talented man who cared enough to pluck a newly orphaned Christine from a path veering into a life of poverty and prostitution, and polish her gift until it shinned like crystal.

All he asked in return was her loyalty.

To what extent, she was slowly learning.

If she did not know better, Christine would have entertained the notion that Erik was the jealous sort and did not want her to partake in the company of other human beings, particularly males, but allowed her simply because it was a basic need.

"Oh my god! Sweet merciful mother."

Christine blinked and noticed Joseph Burquet hanging from the ceiling by a noose. Dead. His eyes wide and void, his complexion white. Feminine shrieks accompanied the clamor or worried voices. A trio of ballet rats stood in the doorway of the chapel, completely consumed by their histrionics. A touch out of breath from her early shock and no longer supported by Erik, Christine took a single step backwards away from the body and swooned.

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_ Murder at the Opera Populaire! _the headlines declared.

_The Opera Ghost killed Burquet for spreading the horrific details of his face! _the ballet rats insisted.

_This Ghost must be stopped before he strikes again! _the manager announced.

The investigations by the _gendarmes_ found nothing but rats in the catacombs and thus Burquet's death was named a suicide. There was no proof of foul play and the man was a known drunk with gambling debts. Upon discovering how much safer they felt when no longer being feasted on by the predator gaze of the fly man, the ballerinas returned to the stage and their gossip, still wary of the ghost and on a certain level, thankful. As for the manager, rumor had it was planning on retiring soon.

An extortionist who played tricks on the cast in order to make the Opera more profitable was something he could tolerate. A murderer was not. Who knew what the supposed Phantom would do if he skipped his salary?

Christine listened quietly as the chaos flooded around her. Her teacher, guardian and angel had killed a man. A bad man. A man who tried to force himself on Christine, thinking she was a loose woman. While the world condemned Erik, ignorant of the truth, she stood on the gray line of ambiguity between what was right and what was moral. God forbade killing, it was a sin which cast a soul into hell, but was killing always wrong? If it was in the defense of another, was it a sin?

She closed her eyes and knelt in the chapel.

Madame Giry kept approaching her, asking Christine what she knew. Nadir tried to do the same, but his presence in the theater was met with suspicion and he was often shooed away before he could demand any answers. Countless eyes were on her whenever she was on stage—not adoring eyes, but critical, accusing eyes. She knew something. They all knew she knew something. She just wanted everyone to leave her alone!

"You seem troubled, _mon petite_."

Christine drew in a shuddering breath and nodded, unable to find the right words to express the heaviness resting on her heart. Not only were Madame Giry and Nadir trailing after her, alongside half of Paris it seemed, but Raoul had become adamant about her leaving the Opera House. He arrived the day after the incident to _rescue_ her, insisting that she come stay with him at the de Chaney estate for her own safety, all the while berating the villain who commit such a heinous crime. No one seemed to believe the police reports that Burquet's death was a suicide, and everyone thought that the rising soprano had the missing piece of the puzzle. Perhaps she was even an accomplice!

Three days. She lasted three days before the clamor sent her crashing.

"It used to be so simple," Christine said at last. Tears crept down her cheeks. The horrors she experienced were all collapsing on top of her. "Papa and I would travel across the countryside, never having much aside from the other. When he died, a piece of me chased him to heaven, and you found it and stitched me back together. You taught me to sing, to hope and be happy, to live. Yes, we fought and there were times where I was terribly scared, but you were always so good to me. My Angel of Music. Then you left and I tried to take care of myself, but you took that part of me which followed Papa to heaven. I don't think you meant to break me; I never knew I would break. But I…I feel as if I am dying, Angel. My soul is not my own, it is in the hands of a murderer…a man I know as an Angel, a father, a friend. Oh Erik, I don't know what to do. My mind says I should allow Raoul to take me away, to protect me from you and your violence, because you will no doubt hurt me again. But my heart, it aches at the prospect of abandoning my maestro, the Angel of Music my father sent to give me song."

A heartbeat of silence, and then…

"I will never leave you again, Christine. God long ago abandoned me, but I will never abandon my greatest treasure. My beautiful little soprano. The only one who can give flight to my songs. Hate me if you must, but I will always love you and will do all in my power to keep you. No mere mortal man will ever separate us. Even if you were to run, to hide with that fop, I would find you and bring you back. You are mine, Christine, and I take good care of what is mine. Sing, my angel, sing and know the music I have given you will always provide. As long as you sing and wear my ring, I will protect you and take care of your every need; even kill for you if I must. So sing! Sing!"

Unable to disobey her teacher, Christine sang.

**tbc**

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**A/N: **Thank you for reading! We are halfway through this tale. Please review, feedback is very important to me. Even an "I like" or "I dislike" is appreciated, though I love analysis and discussion, so feel free to PM me as well.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Part four of six

One of the my reviewers pointed out a couple misspellings on my part. I corrected them for this chapter.

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**The Fiddler's Daughter**

**By Catsitta**

**.4.**

The night before her sixteenth birthday, the nightmares began. Buquet's bloated face and bulging eyes chased her through the dark. He choked, gasped and laughed—the horrible story of the Opera Ghost following her no matter where she turned.

"There is a reason he hides behind a mask. Those who see his face perish, either from fright or at the end of the phantom's Punjab lasso." Christine covered her ears, wishing she could silence his words. "His face can barely be called a face, it is a skull with eyes more like it. Skin like yellowed parchment covers bone and he instead of a nose, there is a hole where one should be. And his eyes, two yellow stars plucked from the night sky, glow like demon eyes in the dark. The phantom dresses like a gentleman, and the white mask covers the atrocity that is his face, but he is a corpse beneath the finery. All skin and bones and the smell of death. You know you're in his presence when you can smell the reek of rotting flesh. Look out for those eyes, that mask and that smell—those are the only warning you will get before the phantom wraps a noose around your neck and snaps it!"

Shrill screams filled her head and Buquet laughed madly.

Unable to run away from or quiet the insanity, Christine thrashed and screamed in agony. Her angel was not a disfigured monster; he was a genius. An eccentric, dangerous genius who created beautiful music.

"He revels in blood! Glories in murder!"

"Leave me alone!"

Christine felt a noose loop around her neck, cutting off all her air supply. It tightened, and tightened, choking out her every effort to scream. Her hands instinctively clawed at the rope, nails fruitlessly biting into the woven cord. Suddenly, her head was snapped back and a gloved hand came to rest between her shoulder blades. Above her, two yellow stars glittered behind a floating mask. The rope cinched tighter. She was dying. Her angel was strangling her.

Amidst the shrieks and Buquet's haunting laughter, the wail of a violin joined in, its whine spiraling higher and higher until it was indistinguishable from the macabre cacophony consuming her. Christine could not withstand it. She just wanted it all to end, to find silence. The mask drifted behind her ear and Erik's beautiful voice crept through the chaos.

"You are mine, my angel. You belong to a monster. No one can save you. I will kill any who try."

The rope drew impossibly tighter around her throat until…

SNAP!

Christine woke gasping, both hands cradling her unbroken neck.

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He came for her before dawn. The sun did not even pink the sky with new light when Erik arrived in the barracks, swathed in his usual black attire and mask. Sleep had evaded Christine since she escaped the nightmare, a mixed blessing given the circumstances. Aware that a single spoken word could wake the other girls sleeping in the uniform cots laid out in rows, separated by only the occasional sheet or paper screen, Christine rose from her bed silently and took her angel's hand without protest. Those yellow stars swept over her nightgown shrouded form, eliciting an involuntary shiver. It was cold underground. Erik never liked her getting chilled.

But instead of demanding she dress in more suitable attire, or even allowing her to slip on shoes, Erik guided Christine to the wall. With a flick of his wrist, it opened, and soon, they were swallowed by the dark. Weak and still shaken by her dreams, Christine stumbled more often than usual, forcing her angel to catch her and eventually, pluck her into his arms. He carried her through the musty spaces between walls, down rickety ladders made of moldering rope and after an endless span of silence, he brought her into the winding labyrinth of tunnels which protected his domain. Without light to guide him, Erik traversed the supposedly trap-laced maze with ease, pausing on occasion to pull a lever or touch a wall.

He was not a big man, tall but frail. Christine could not fathom how he could carry her for so long when he looked like a stiff wind could blow him apart. Yet carry her he did, a surprising degree of strength in those bones. When he placed her in a boat to pole them both across the lake, Christine at last found a crumb of a voice to speak with.

"I had a nightmare," she confessed, as she had many of times as a child. Erik rarely sympathized, often dismissing her fears with a huff, but he listened. He always listened. "I saw Buquet dying again. I heard him telling the tale of the horrible Opera Ghost. It was awful, and the screams…then a rope wrapped around my neck…and I died. You killed me. You said I was yours and then snapped my neck like you did to Buquet."

Tears glimmering in her eyes, Christine stared up at her guardian. The Angel of Music did not speak, nor look her way, but his posture was unnaturally stiff and in the sparse light glittering on the lake from a pair of nearby sconces, she could see his grip on the pole was deathly tight.

"Why did you kill him, Erik?"

Upon hearing his name, Erik placed those yellow stars on her, his gaze piercing.

"I prefer it when you call me Angel," he said, ignoring her question. "Erik is a monster. His name should never cross your lips and it pains me when it does."

"Perhaps the girl who called you Angel has grown up and seen through the façade. You are no angel, monsieur, and I'm not foolish enough to continue a childish fantasy from my youth."

Her response did not please him and to speak it surprised Christine. Never was she bold enough to challenge Erik on his insistence on being called an angel. True, when she was younger, she yelled at him, bickering as a young woman does with her father when she starts to grow up and realizes that he is not without fault. However, it was two years since they lived in harmony beneath the Opera House, surviving off music as she struggled to flourish beneath his crushing demands.

Growing up in the scant company of a genius playing angel and a foreign man who seemed to fear for her health, made Christine a touch out of sorts with the world. She did not understand why people did as they did and how society worked, thus she stayed in the security of the theater, safe in the company of Meg and Madame Giry, quietly listening to the gossip and drifting through the glamor. Then Raoul swept in, dashing, daring and willing to flout the rules, and it rattled her world. He preached about how ladies should act and how every woman needed to make a good marriage, and in the same breath, he made her feel both accepted and alienated in the weird world she grew up apart from.

Raoul offered a chance to become normal.

Erik took it away with a few angry words, a backhanded strike, and a murder. Now he was dragging her back into the dark, Christine his willing victim. He gave her voice, her gave her song, he gave her music…without him, her soul died. But he was poison. Because of him, she was a nervous wreck who stood center stage amongst the gossip mongers who knew she knew Buquet's murderer. Because of him, she could not find a moment's peace or rest, her mind was at war with itself!

Yet here she was, sitting in a narrow wooden gondola, placed there after being carried by him through his domain. A part of her wondered why she did not scream when he arrived to take her away. He was a monster. But her heart knew why. Because for all he was a monster, he was still her angel and master. He commanded her soul with her voice. Without him and his music, she could not survive. For years he saturated her in song until she was addicted and began to wither without it, and was willing to compromise her morals to have it engulf her again.

Just a few more days, Christine swore to herself. After Erik trusted her again and released her, she would be done with him. No more crawling back. It was not healthy. She would heal. A family would fill the gaping wound in her soul when she abandoned music for the sake of living free.

The boat knocked against the shore, candles illuminating the sprawling caverns of Erik's dark world. Instead of assisting Christine from the craft, he thrust himself onto solid ground and stared at her expectantly. Those yellow stars burned with discontent. Feeling uncomfortable beneath his gaze, Christine quickly scrambled ashore, but her feet and the nightgown's hem were soaked in the process, chilling her small body. Erik motioned for her to follow, and like an obedient child, Christine complied, head bowed.

When they reached Christine's bedroom, with its white-and-gilded motif, Erik did not stop at the doorway as she expected. Only on the rarest of occasions did he ever enter her room. Instead, he swept within, awaking candles with a flourish of his cape like a gypsy magician, and came to a pause at the side of the expansive bed. Upon it was an unfamiliar bundle of frothy cloth, which Erik gathered up as if it were a newborn babe, before turning and commanding her closer with a silent jerk of his chin.

Christine was curious and somewhat fearful of what the bundle meant. It appeared to be a dress of some kind, but why would Erik present her with such a grandiose white gown? Weren't white dresses strictly meant for…weddings?

Her eyes widened and she gasped when the realization struck. Frozen, Christine did not react as Erik allowed the voluminous skirts to unfold, each tier falling into place with a slight pull or shake until a beautiful wedding gown appeared. Long lace sleeves dangled from the beaded bodice, complimenting the high-necked lace collar and ruffled underskirts. Pearl buttons gleamed in the candlelight, opalescent and delicate against their nest of white cloth. Even while held aloft and unfastened, it was apparent that the gown was meant to be worn with a very tight corset; the waist tapered tightly before flaring broadly into the hips, giving it a wasp-like shape.

"Erik, why do you have a wedding dress?" Christine asked once she regained her breath.

"I made it," Erik said with a brief, adoring smile at the gown. He held so much affection for his creations, likely due to the fact that art and architecture could not scorn you and did not protest to having a single purpose, to convey the message of the artist. "It was supposed to be my gift to you in a few years, when you were older, more mature. I wanted to see you married in something I made specifically for you. Isn't it beautiful?"

Christine nodded, "Lovely. Like it was taken straight from a fairy tale." She frowned and fidgeted with the sleeve of her nightgown, toes curling into the plush warmth of the sheepskin rug. "Erik, why are you showing me the dress now if you meant it to be a present for when I married? You told me that Raoul wasn't interested in marriage." A statement she was not inclined to believe. Once she left this place again, she would accept Raoul's proposal. The theater would only hamper her healing and drown her with memories. "Is this your way of approving the match?"

All affection fled from those yellow stars. Erik's grip visibly tightened, crinkling the delicate fabric briefly before he relaxed. Those strange, oddly-shaped lips of his twitched, as if he were fighting against speaking his mind, something he never did. Restraint was new. The Angel of Music was infamous for his passions.

"This is Erik's—_is my_—way of making sure you are taken care of properly. I promised you that dedication to me and music would provide for your every need. These past couple years revealed some areas where I was painfully neglectful and I seek to correct those errors," he said slowly. "You are a young woman who needs companionship and not simply that of other young women. Suitors and offspring linger in your head, put there by both society and biology. I should have known, even monsters feel the need for more than solitude, driven by nature to find like-minded souls to fill that vast space within with light. You are beautiful and talented and there are many men out there who would prey upon your innocence, like that _fop_."

Erik growled as if the world left a bad taste in his mouth before continuing, "Men who would turn you against me, your angel, your teacher. Men who would suffocate your soul by stripping it of music for the sake a few heirs and pretty trophy in their parlor. I promised to take care of you Christine and I meant in all aspects. You seek a good marriage and children, and I see no reason to refuse these things from you if they are what you desire. Put the dress on, Christine. I have arranged for you a wedding."

"What? You have arranged a marriage? I am sixteen. I do not want to marry a stranger!"

Erik thrust the dress into her arms, "Put the dress on before I lose my patience. You promised to do what I asked in exchange for my trust."

"I did not think you would sell me off as if I were chattel! You're my teacher, not my father, you have no right to do this."

His lips twitched again, "I have every right. You are mine, Christine, to do with as I will. Now. Put. On. The. Dress! I have no qualms against dressing you as if you were a child."

"You wouldn't dare," Christine narrowed her eyes and stepped backwards. Erik reached out with one foot, hooked his ankle around her vanity's stool and pulled it close; after arranging the dress upon it so that it would not wrinkle, he returned his attention to her. Realizing a moment to late he wasn't bluffing, Christine began to scramble for the door, only to have the door slammed shut inches from her nose, Erik's palm an immovable anchor. She lunged to the side and her angel lazily pursed, not exactly giving chase as much as waiting for her to stumble and catching her when her foot tangled with one of the rugs.

He gripped her arm with bruising strength and did not react when Christine began to writhe against his hold. Erik quietly allowed her to pull and struggle, even strike him in her desperate attempt at escape until she buckled from exhaustion, her faced streaked with tears. Why would he do this? He said he loved her; why would he sell her to some stranger man when there was a perfect one waiting above, titled and handsome?

"Are you done making a fool of yourself?" Erik asked. He received a shuddering sob as an answer. "Very well, you forced my hand." Said hand tugged at the ties of her nightgown, revealing the pale flesh of Christine's throat and right shoulder. Christine caught his hand and held it in her pale, quivering one.

"I-I can do this myself."

Erik watched her impassively, his head tilted slight to one side, "You will put on the dress."

"Y-yes. I will p-put on the dress."

"Good girl."

In a flick of his cape and a flash of yellow stars, Erik left Christine alone in the room, clutching a wedding dress and sobbing.

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"You look beautiful, _mon petite_."

Christine stared at the sad girl in the mirror. The dress was beautiful and her curls were artfully pulled up with a mother-of-pearl comb, but her skin was pallid instead of pale, her lips nearly white and her blue eyes shot with red. The flush of her cheeks was not from rouge but raw, reddened skin, sticky with dried tears. Damp lashes were strikingly dark against her sickly countenance in a doll-like fashion. She was beautiful, as a virgin sacrifice was beautiful when resigned to the altar or the dragon's fire. Sad, frightened and vulnerable—beautiful in her defeat.

"Come along Christine," he bid. His obedient student, slave to his music and voice, Christine followed, aware that her beloved Angel was leading her towards pain once again. Why did she keep letting him hurt her?

_It is because I love him_, she thought. _And he loves me. He loves me enough to kill for me…and I love him enough to let him. He was all I had when Papa died and I was all he had in his eternal solitude. We needed each other. Then I grew up, he let me go…but his love is selfish. I should have known he would not let me leave him for good. Until recently, I desired to return…now…now I understand why he would be afraid, why he would capture me. I wanted to leave. He never meant for me to be free of the Opera, free of his fathering gaze…his haunting, horrible music._

Without touching her, Erik guided Christine through a passageway to the land above, using a different set of passages leading opposite of the lake. After traveling what felt like hours, her now stocking-and- shoe clad feet aching, Erik pulled open a wall, revealing the morning sky. They were somewhere on the outskirts of the city, a horse-and-carriage standing idle nearby.

Jules, the man who drove Christine to the graveyard throughout the years, held the reigns of the carriage horses as well as a rope loosely tied to Cesar, Erik's fickle black stallion. The horse nickered when he spotted Erik, and tossed his elegant head, clearly pleased to his master. Her Angel promptly untied the rope from the stallion, leaving him free of any bondage. Cesar followed Erik by choice and both man and beast hated to be restrained, thus he rode the horse without a saddle or bridle.

As Erik stroked the stallions nose, Jules released the reigns of the horses long enough to open the door of the carriage. Neither the beasts of burden nor the man moved as Christine warily approached. Jules offered a polite nod and a hand when she reached the door, easily guiding her into the carriage despite the bulk of her many skirts. Sitting proved a trial, but there was an extra pair of hands to help: Nadir's.

When the Persian's calloused fingers began plucking and smoothing layers of fabric, Christine jumped a little in surprise, before covering her mouth to silence the resurgence of tears. Jade eyes flickered in the curtained confines of the carriage, paternal and full of pain, like a father watching his daughter weep in distress at the altar. He shushed her and wiped a tear away from Christine's raw cheeks, but she could not hold it in.

She was being married off against her will to a stranger!

"Calm yourself, _petite_. There is no point in wasting tears."

"I thought he l-loved m-me," Christine sobbed. "H-he would yell and break things, b-but he n-never hurt me until…until H-henry kissed me. Then he hit me, and a-abandoned me f-for a year. R-raoul would n-never do that t-to me."

"The Vicomte? No, he doesn't seem the type of fellow who would do that to a woman," Nadir said in a soothing croon.

"Now E-erik is selling me t-to a stranger. H-he says Raoul is b-bad for me, and d-doesn't love me…but all Erik k-knows is music. All he cares about is m-my voice. If I m-married Raoul, I wouldn't b-be able to sing in the O-opera, and…and…Oh Nadir, what am I t-to do?"

Nadir clenched one hand around a knee, as if doing so would stop his leg from bobbing with the natural tremor of a moving carriage. His tanned face was pale, his lips pressed unnaturally thin. "Erik is unpredictable, in both his moods and actions. What goes on in that mind of his is fathomless and indubitably disturbing," Nadir said. "Defying him is dangerous, especially when he is in this particular mode—no mortal man can change Erik's course without losing his life. Christine, I wish I had acted sooner, taken you away, consequences be damned…perhaps this never would have happened. But I wanted desperately to believe that Erik could be good. I watched him raise you, do his best to mend your wounds, same as he did for his pets in Persia. He never hurt an animal before and he protects his art with jealous devotion, and he seemed to perceive you as something between a pet and a piece of art…but I should have known better, should have remembered what happened to the Palace. He is willing to destroy everything and everyone if only not to have what he _loves_ taken away, including the object of his affections."

"What do you mean?"

"Had I acted sooner, I might have been able to take you someplace safe, freeing you from your fate at the cost of my life alone." Nadir murmured comforting nonsense when Christine let out a despairing wail. "We all die and I have expected to perish at the hands of the Angel of Doom for years. He tolerates me because I spared his life. I protected him because I saw good in him. Now, I find it difficult to see the light which once made me take pity on Erik. He promised never to kill again. He swore it after I tended you that first night, eight years ago. I could see that he wanted to be good; you called him Angel and depended on him for everything, and it made him want to stop hurting people. Then he broke his promise and snuffed the light inside of himself. He is walking on a razor thin edge of sanity right now. The only thing we can do is comply with his wishes or try to kill him, which if we fail at doing, all of Paris will burn."

"NO! No. No. No more death. No more. I want to wake up from this nightmare," Christine said as she clutched Nadir's arm. Perhaps if she closed her eyes and prayed hard enough, her eight-year-old self would wake up in her Papa's arms, the steady thrum of his heart rhythmic against her ear. Helpless, confused, and with her life spiraling out of control—Christine wept.

The tears kept falling until she drifted into a reluctant slumber.

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The carriage stopped. Jules opened the door. Nadir offered his arm.

Quaking from exhaustion, still half-asleep, Christine fumbled for the Persian's arm and weakly allowed him to pick her up like a bedraggled kitten when her knees failed to support her weight. She glanced up at their destination once she regained feeling in her limbs, and struggled not to start crying again. They were on the steps of the church where her Papa was buried. If she were to skirt around the modest chapel, she would find a sprawling lawn of carved wood and chiseled stones confined by a rusting iron fence. A single weeping angel guarded the entrance, its face nearly featureless from the careless caress of time.

She sniffed.

_'Papa, I need you. Why did you leave me?'_

Nadir guided her towards the church doors.

_'I promised my soul to a monster, thinking he was the Angel of Music.'_

Christine's head swam as the double doors were opened.

_'You promised, Papa. You promised me an Angel.'_

Three men stood at the front of the church. One wizened and wearing robes, clearly the priest. One was Jules, who looked somber as he held his hat in gloved hands. The third was the groom, who stood tall and imperious, his back towards her.

No music announced her entrance as Christine dreamed of as a child. No friends or family filled the pews. Early morning light set dancing dust motes aglow and cast a rainbow of shadows through the stained-glass images of biblical scenes. The centermost window portrayed the traditional scene of Madonna and Son sitting upon a wooden throne, both haloed and surrounded by trumpeting angels. Jesus clutched at his mother's breast and gazed down upon those whom visited the church, his face a man's face painted upon an infant's body, his eyes piercing as if alive yet paradoxically vacant of all consciousness.

She stared at the window, praying to God for strength and wishing for a veil to hide her face as tears continued to streak down inflamed cheeks. In silence, Christine begged for her father to do something, to save his little girl. Nadir came to a stop and released her, breaking Christine from her frantic, internal pleading. Fearfully, she glanced up at the groom, wondering whom Erik chose.

Her heart launched into her throat.

Two yellow stars gleamed in the sunlight.

What was going on? Where was his mask? What was wrong with his face? Christine squeaked as she quickly drank in the strange visage of her Angel. It took only a few seconds to realize that the hawkish, yet striking face was another mask—with its high cheekbones, stately nose and arched brows. To a stranger, the flesh-toned creation would look odd but within reasonable standards of normal. Only the strange puffiness of Erik's lower lip and those unmistakable yellow eyes betrayed the identity of the Opera Ghost.

She was used to seeing the emotionless white mask and had come to think of it as his face. It did not occur to her that it was potentially one of many Erik possessed and that his true face lied beneath the stark façade. _Why is he wearing a mask at all_? she wondered. _Outside of the Opera House, no one knows of a man in a white mask. The legend of the ghost lives solely within its walls. _Was he a known criminal hiding his identity? Or was wearing a mask simply one of his infinite quirks, one she dismissed so early on that it never tickled her curiosity?

As she stared, the priest began to speak the ceremonial vows in Latin. Christine recalled her lessons in languages and did her best to shake the dust free, but those yellow eyes proved too much of a distraction. Erik, her guardian and teacher, Angel of Music and Angel of Death, denied her a marriage to Raoul in favor of himself. Why? He was like a father to her, a friend and tutor. Their relationship was strained at the best, given his fits of violence, and he never indicated any romantic interest at any point. He rarely touched her! A few embraces, a smattering of hand holding and a pair of bruising encounters did not make for a courtship. Nor did scolding her like a parent or tormenting her with cruel music.

Christine found her tears drying as her thoughts began to swirl and strange things started to make sense. This wedding…it proved the selfishness of Erik's love. No, not quite. It was not love at all. It was obsession. Erik was madly obsessed with her. Love did not hurt. Love did not leave bruises. Love was freedom not chains of control. He claimed his obsession as love…and despite all the hurt, Christine ached for him as a child does for sickly father. Erik wasn't well and if she demanded answers here, in the church, as God laid witness to this farce of a wedding, he would sink deeper into the darkness.

As Nadir warned, he might even kill again.

Unable to stop trembling, Christine shivered as the ceremony droned on, her eyes locked onto those yellow stars. She saw only coldness. Would this angry, icy man demand his husbandly rights? Meg claimed bed play was quite thrilling with the right partner, though how she knew this Christine was not quite certain. If he did claim those rights, would he be cruel or gentle? Perhaps he would ignore her again, leave her to singing songs on stage without touching her. The Opera Ghost and Angel of Music were both infamous for disappearing, never lingering long if he chose to appear. Despite her knowing he was a tangible man, Erik was prone to pretending he was capable of becoming invisible whilst he hid in the walls. Then again, he was upset and when he was disgruntled, Erik tended to act more physical and less _divine_.

She shook her head to clear it.

The priest droned on.

Erik continued to stare.

After an eternity, he bid the bride and groom to swear themselves to each other. Neither Erik nor Christine hesitated overly long to speak the required words, or make the required actions. When he announced that no man would be able to break asunder what God bound together, Erik reached forwards with one gloved hand to cup Christine's chin. This was when the man and woman kissed. She winced at the thought and Erik yanked his hand back as if scalded with boiling water.

"The papers," Erik said in clipped tones to the priest. The wizened man nodded and motioned for them to follow. Christine stepped hesitantly behind her new husband, who strode across the room like a wild cat on the prowl. The priest fumbled for a bit with some papers on a podium, nearly touching his nose to them as he examined each one, before laying one flat and offering Erik a feather pen. He scribbled onto it with his usual flourish, leaving behind a distorted, childish scrawl where his name belonged. Then he turned and thrust the pen into her hand, "Sign your name."

"What is my name?" Christine asked as she examined his signature. She could see the trace impression of the name Erik, but the surname was lost in an unintelligible muddle.

"Christine Daaé."

"But…"

"Sign the paper, Christine."

Feeling the tears return, Christine signed her soul over to the devil.

**tbc**

**A/N: **Thanks for reading! Review please!


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Part five of six.

This chapter is a slightly different flavor than the rest, but still dark.

**The Fiddler's Daughter**

**By Catsitta**

.5.

"What are you doing?"

"Shush, it is late and you must be terribly uncomfortable in this dress."

"I-I don't need help. Stop that!"

"If you did not need help, why are you attempting to sleep whilst wearing it?"

"Please stop."

"We are alone, the candles are out. Do not forget that we are now husband and wife."

"ERIK STOP!"

The hands which were unbuttoning the back of Christine's wedding dress stilled and she began to gulp down wet, panicked breaths. It was true, she was not able to escape her gown, but only because she was too tired to wrestle with the buttons and ties. Sleeping in a corset, especially one as tight as the dress required, was ill advised, but unavoidable without help.

"Do not call me Erik," her Angel growled as he returned to attacking at the buttons, this time with more force. She felt one rip in his no longer gentle hands. "Call me anything but that. Angel is preferred, but I will settle for Maestro or Husband…my wife. Yes, my wife. My beautiful, living wife."

Lips pressed beneath her left ear. Odd, misshapen lips that were puffy and dry. Breath ticked Christine's neck. One hand slipped through the open back of her dress to stroke between her shoulder blades. Unable to handle the way he made her heart pound and throat tighten, Christine began to struggle. She did not want this. Why was he doing this? Marriage was bad enough, but for him to attempt consummation…it was too much. She wanted everything to go back to the way it was before Henry kissed her.

Erik would be once again her beloved maestro, a man who she accepted as the Angel of Music. Buquet would be alive; Raoul would be but a childhood memory, and all would be innocent again. There would be no violence, no murder, and no forced marriage.

"Please stop," Christine begged.

"You are a good girl, Christine. Good girls do as their husbands tell them. Good girls—."

"Bad men force their wives into consummating a marriage she never wanted!" Christine said. "Leave me alone, _Monsieur_. You hurt me enough by forcing me to marry you. Please don't…do _things_ to me."

Those hands once again ceased their wandering as he said in a child-like voice, "I would never force my love onto my living wife, she would die if I did." As if he was suddenly broken from a trance, Erik shoved away from the bed and stumbled towards the door. She heard him open it then slam it shut, muttering manically to himself. "Erik is a bad man. Erik doesn't deserve a living wife. No monster deserves such beauty. Oh, he thought Christine loved him. No one can love Erik. She loves the Angel of Music and the fop but loathes Erik. Stupid, selfish Erik! How dare he try to touch Christine as if he were a human. She spurns him. Denys him the joys of the flesh. Because she is a good girl and Erik is a monster…"

His voice trailed off into silence.

Christine felt a few tears creep down her cheeks.

As expected, music filled the air, obliterating the silence with chaotic chords, searing Christine to the core with his agony. The Angel of Music, cruel in his passions, had returned, reminding Christine that Erik was more than a mere, mortal man. He was a genius with a broken mind, a blackened heart and a voice which could bring all of heaven's angel to their knees.

.

.

A fortnight passed. Christine was certain it had been two weeks since Erik married her based on meals and her monthly. She was unable to confirm it since her unwanted husband vanished after pounding his misery onto the pipe organ. Christine knew Erik was around given the state of the cupboards and the violent music which permeated the labyrinth when she was abed. Twice she attempted to confront him, but the door to her room was locked whenever the tell-tale whine of the violin or rumble of the pipe organ invaded her mind.

Erik wanted to play Angel of Music.

Christine wanted freedom.

Two weeks were enough to bolster her crumbed confidence and rile her temper. She was no longer a little girl. She would no longer be pacified by music or cowed by his threats.

Christine stood by the organ, clenched her fists and began to sing. Poorly. When her squawking garnered no attention, she smashed her palms against the keyboard, filling the room with hideous noise. Frustrated tears pricked at her eyes, but she banished them with a swipe of a hand and began to shriek insults and threats.

"Coward! Why won't you come out of hiding?" Christine wailed, reaching for the nearest instrument she could lift with one hand. A finely crafted Viola found its neck caught in her steely grasp. "Show yourself or I'll break all of your precious instruments. I'll rip up your music and throw your books in the lake…"

She was met with infuriating silence.

Every ounce of pent up fear, anger and frustration exploded in a scream as Christine gripped the priceless Viola in both hands, lifted it above her head and smashed it into a million splinters. She screamed again, half-sobbing and reached for another instrument, a bassoon. The double-reed instrument met a similar fate to the Viola as Christine swung it around like a battle-axe, bashing it against a Cello, a music stand and the side of the pipe organ. Next she grabbed any papers within reach and flung them heedlessly around the room, making it snow Erik's handwritten original pieces.

Christine pulled at her hair in frustration before running for the door to Erik's underground abode. She pulled on the handle, expecting it to be locked as it usually was, but found it open. Christine did not linger to wonder at her luck, instead she bolted into the scarcely lit dark, skirts held aloft as she ran, and nearly tripped into the lake in her haste. Erik's boat was nowhere in sight, which meant she would have to swim.

Without removing her shoes or any of the numerous layers of cloth, she waded into the lake. It was not deep water. At the most it rose to Christine's shoulders as she floundered towards the portcullis. Once she passed the raised iron gate, she could follow the water to the tunnels and towards freedom. She would navigate those dark passages and escape from Erik's neglectful grip.

Christine shuffled towards freedom.

As the water retreated to rest beneath her knees, something gripped her ankle and pulled her under. Christine fell to her knees with a cry, her wrists aching as she caught herself against the rocky bottom of the lake. As she attempted to rise, she was pulled backwards, deeper into the water. Christine thrashed, desperate to escape, but she could not break free. She was pulled beneath the surface, cutting off air to her compressed lungs. Bubbles frothed around her mouth as she fought to hold her breath. Had the lake gotten deeper?

She reached towards the surface, fingers clawing at the water separating her from needed air. Christine watched the water ripple and churn above her, reacting to her struggles, but deeper and deeper she kept being pulled. Her will to fight faded with every heartbeat and slowly, darkness started to close in.

…Down.

Christine closed her eyes.

…Down.

Every instinct warred with itself, to breathe or not.

…Down.

To suffocate or to drown.

.

.

"BREATHE!"

Christine breathed.

.

.

"Stupid girl. Christine is a stupid girl. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. Christine could have died. Then Erik would have a corpse bride instead of a living wife and Erik cannot live without a living wife. If Christine dies then Erik would have no reason to live. He would crawl into Christine's coffin and kill himself. Yes, so he could be with his wife. The wife he loves so much."

Cold hands, the hands of a corpse stroked Christine's face. She groaned and attempted to open her eyes. Every inch of her body hurt.

"Christine is freezing," Erik muttered as he cradled Christine to his chest, rocking her back-and-forth as if she were a fussing infant. "Heat. Christine needs heat. Oh but Erik's world is so cold."

She was no longer clad in her dress, or any clothes for that matter. Her nude body was swaddled in countless blankets as Erik held her, clearly upset, possibly even frightened. He generally only rocked when distressed, too overwhelmed by his emotions to do more than stare at the wall and babble endlessly.

Her musings were interrupted by a violent series of coughs erupting from her lungs. Christine gasped as she regained her breath and attempted to wriggle away from Erik. She was not cold, she was hot. Too hot. She needed to escape the blankets and put on a nightgown, something breezy and cool. Erik was smothering her.

"Christine is flushed…fever…Please no. God, have some mercy for poor, ugly Erik! Do not take away the only good thing he has left."

As she wriggled free of some of the blankets and the cool air kissed her, Christine no longer felt swelteringly hot. Instead, she felt a chill deeper than her bones. Bile rolled in her gut and clung to her throat, filling Christine's dry mouth with bitterness. Shivering uncontrollably, she huddled back into the blankets, wondering how long it would be before she would be warm again.

Erik muttered under his breath before lying Christine down on the bed as if she were an antique porcelain doll. He left the room, leaving her to cope with the ever changing fits of overheating and chills, claiming he needed to fetch her medicine. Erik was no doctor. He was abandoning her! Christine mewled in distress when the minutes drew long, her head filled with thoughts of dying alone in a half-lit room underground.

She felt his shadow drape over the bed and sighed in relief.

"I'm sorry 'bout your instruments…"

"Pardon?"

Christine attempted to sit up, "I broke them."

"Material things can be replaced, _mon petite_," Erik said as he sat on the edge of the bed and pressed the edge of a glass against her lips. "Now drink."

Warmth oozed down into her stomach as she swallowed the potion, stealing away the awful chill. With a grateful smile, Christine gazed up at her worried Angel.

The smile fled as soon as she saw his face.

Buquet's voice filled her aching head.

_'His face can barely be called a face, it is a skull with eyes more like it. Skin like yellowed parchment covers bone and he instead of a nose, there is a hole where one should be. And his eyes, two yellow stars plucked from the night sky, glow like demon eyes in the dark…'_

In his desperation to rescue her, Erik lost the impressive guise of ghostly gentleman and apparently had yet to notice his mask-less state. He really was a horror to witness. A true atrocity. How could God make a human being look so _dead_ while clearly alive? Without the impassive mask and dapper suit, Erik resembled a skeleton with skin with a few thickened areas of muscle on his chest, shoulders and thighs—Christine could see the outline of every rib and vertebra and his stomach was hollowed instead of flat or full. He was so pale, his skin almost translucent, revealing every bulging blue vein and bearing a jaundiced tint. Then there was his face. His misshapen mockery of a face.

His bottom lip was the only familiar feature, swollen and distorted beneath a twisted upper lip. He possessed a nose, or at least the collapsed remnants one. It wasn't a gaping pit in the middle of his face, instead it was a slightly raised protrusion with a flap of thin skin covering it and two slits resembling nostrils. Above the ruined nose were two hollow sockets with yellow stars gleaming within them, his skull-tight skin emphasizing the void depths. And above those familiar stars was a waterlogged wig resting at a precarious angle atop Erik's wisp-covered head.

"Christine?" Erik said as he took note of Christine's intense gaze. Those yellow stars widened and he hesitantly touched the askew wig and an exposed cheek. As soon as his fingertips brushed bare skin, Erik splayed an open hand over his mockery of a face and turned away, howling in agony. "No! Christine was never supposed to see Erik's loathsome face. She can never love Erik now! She will fear him, despise him…oh what misery!" She watched as he dropped the ground, both hands covering his face and began to rock to-and-fro. "Christine will never stay. She will leave Erik for the fop and his golden beauty, and Erik will die! Why! Why must this face ruin everything? It taints all Erik dares to love. He kills everything he touches because the world has decreed him incapable of anything else. He is a monster. A hideous gargoyle desperately seeking the beauty God denied him! Seeking the love a horrified mother denied him. Seeking…desperate…Oh, Christine."

He wailed again and began to scratch at his deformed visage as if it were a mask he could remove with enough effort. Yellowed nails bit into thin, fragile skin and scored deep rivets into pallid flesh.

Like any mortal man would, Erik bled red.

The blood seeped and gushed, pulsing into his spidery hands like water from a fountain. His horrifying face, which roiled her stomach at first glance, was now a mutilated disaster. No longer did he look dead; Erik instead looked as if he were freshly mauled and on the brink of dying. He kept ripping at his face until he could gain no purchase with his blood-clotted nail on slickened skin.

Unable to comprehend or handle the shock, Christine lost control of her stomach and vomited onto the sheepskin rug, opposite of the bed where Erik knelt. Then she began to cough. And cough. It was difficult to breathe and she was cold. So cold. Helpless, Christine huddled in the blankets, her whimpers lost beneath the agonized wails of a fallen angel.

Somewhere in the distance, a violin began to play, beckoning the fiddler's daughter to close her eyes and sing soprano until all the pain faded away.

.

.

"You cannot leave. I won't let you. Christine will stay with Erik forever! Fear can turn to love, and you will someday forget my face. We will be happy. Christine will want for nothing."

.

.

"W-where am I? W-why is it so dark? Why can't I see?"

.

.

_"Now you can never leave me."_

.

.

No, she could not leave. To leave would mean facing the big, bright world above without sight. To leave would mean pity and failure. To leave…it was an impossible dream. Christine idly wondered how long it had been since the fever consumed all rationality and stolen away her senses. In moments of bitterness, she questioned if this was a mechanism of Erik's part, a means of control, a way of keeping her from seeing him unmasked. However, it was too late. She had seen him and his horrible visage. Her last memories that of him bleeding, painting red the yellowed parchment he called skin.

"Wife?"

Christine turned to face the sound of Erik's voice. The living corpse insisted on calling her wife and little else. He did not yell or handle her roughly when she regarded him mutely, refusing to speak, much less sing. His trapped little song bird had lost its will to sing. Her soul was a broken thing, shattered by Erik's forceful hand and negligence. He had not left her since that day where she took ill. Christine often wished he would. At least then she would have privacy, some time to discover and regain a sense of self.

Instead he treated her like some glass doll, too precious to allow alone. He sang to her and played beautiful music until Christine succumbed to exhaustion. As if she were a child again, Erik put her to bed each evening and made certain she ate. All food tasted of dust and the plush comfort of the feather bed was like sleeping on nails, but she did little to protest. He had done it. He had consumed her. No more freedom for the soprano who once thought him an angel. His selfish obsession, the things he called love, was all that sustained her.

Erik forced her to keep breathing.

To keep walking.

To keep living.

On occasion, she heard explosive arguments the tunnels. Erik intercepted any trespassers and turned them around. When she first realized that she would never hear Nadir's rough voice again, nor Madame Giry's or Meg's…Christine wept. She wept for days. And when Raoul came to mind, she lost her voice. The solitude which once cradled her now suffocated. She was not a little girl with her Angel of Music, passing the endless night with music and lessons. No, she was a woman. A grown woman made a wife too young, all ambition ripped away by a madman's selfishness.

"Wife, I have a gift."

It was enough to make Christine want to laugh hysterically. She was a wife with a hideous, unwanted husband who kept her prisoner in his dark domain, and here he was offering a present. Not that his appearance mattered all too much. The mask was his face as far as she was concerned. But his insanity, his cruelty, it made him ugly. Too ugly to withstand any longer. She knew his temper and knew now that he was unafraid to strike her, to punish her with abandonment. He twisted her mind and played with her emotions, manipulated her into compliance.

"Christine, _mon petite_, will you not smile for your husband?" Erik bid, his voice child-like. "If you smile, you can have it." First he asks for a smile, next he will be asking for kisses. Christine knew how Erik's mind worked, thus she remained impassive. "Oh, please smile. It has been too long. Erik had done everything he can to make Christine happy. He treats her kind, never raises his voice, brings her beautiful things. Erik is being good, so good to his lovely wife…why won't she smile for him?"

Silence ensued. Then a sigh and a shuffle of paper. Christine felt the air shift as Erik moved to stand behind her and began to pluck the pins from her hair. Once the locks were free, he played with them, as a lover might, before quickly tying the curls up with a length of fabric. A ribbon. Erik's gift was another ribbon.

"You look lovely," he said.

Christine dropped her eyes and remained silent.

"Would Christine like to sing?" Erik asked, his fingers toying absently with the ends of her hair. "No? Erik loves it when Christine sings, it makes him feel human." Spindly hands shakily stroked her curls before falling across the skin of her neck. He was not wearing gloves. His flesh was cool. "Wife…Erik loves his wife. He would do anything to make her happy…"

As the quiet grew thick, he shuddered.

"How about we go to bed? The hour is drawing late."

Without protest, Christine allowed her unwanted husband, her fallen Angel of Music, to guide her to her feet into the bedroom. Whispered caresses followed as Erik adoringly undressed her and eased Christine into a long nightgown. His touches lingered longer every night. She knew he was fighting temptation. He was a man, after all, her husband.

"What must I do to regain your love, Christine?"

When she yet again said nothing, he laid her on the sheets and tucked her in. His cool body joined her a short while later.

Unsurprisingly, Erik pressed a kiss against Christine's throat, his spidery hands daring to trace in the dark what he was reluctant to touch in the light. She knew what he desired. She knew what would one day come. She also knew, that she would not resist.

Erik had won.

.

.

"Erik."

"Is something the matter? Are you unwell? Do you need something? It has been too long since I last heard your voice. Say something else, even if it is that accursed, awful name."

"M-my monthly…"

"Your...? Ah, yes. Do not fret my dear, it is the natural course of things."

"What do you mean?"

A hand splayed upon Christine's stomach as Erik pulled her flush against him. She was uncertain whether the contact was something to be reviled or reveled in.

"I promised you long ago to give you all that you need, that your every desire would be met as long as you were sworn to me. Given that you speak now after such an extended silence heartens me. I made the right choice. I have given you what you need to be happy."

"Erik, stop speaking in riddles."

"A family, Christine. We will have together what you forsook music for when you almost accepted that fop's proposal."

"No."

"We shall be together for eternity, no mortal able to tear us asunder."

**-tbc-**

**A/N: **Almost done. And I have a feeling, based on reviews, that my plans for the story differed quite a bit from what some of my readers had in mind. Heh. Thank you for reading, and as always, please review!


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Part six of six. The final twist in the tale. After this, I'm changing the description to include the words "Dark" and "complete"

**The Fiddler's Daughter**

**By Catsitta**

.6.

.

A middle-aged man adjusted the violin resting against his neck with a scowl, his yellow eyes narrowed with consternation. The finicky instrument was impossible to tune in the winter. As his long fingers plucked agitatedly across the rivets and strings, he failed to notice the arrival of another person until she cleared her throat. He glanced up to see a pair of blue eyes staring at him, their owner smiling sadly.

"Abigale…I was not expecting you," he said after watching the woman for a long while. "Your youngest was born nary more than a fortnight ago. Shouldn't you be with her?"

"I couldn't possibly leave you alone on this day Gustave."

"Why not, the others did easily enough."

With a sigh, Abigale approached Gustave and laid a hand on his shoulder. The lace-gloved appendage looked so dainty and frail against the starkness of his suit jacket. However, all Gustave could think about was how inappropriate the lace was for the thick of winter. There was snow on the ground for God's sake! Lowering the violin to his side, he glared at the woman beside him.

"You look so much like Father when you do that."

Gustave grimaced, "Of course I do. With these eyes how could I look like anyone else but Father?"

"I mean the frowning," Abigale said. "He was always frowning at one thing or another."

"You mean he was sneering. If he wasn't sneering, he was yelling."

"Gustave…"

"Don't," he held his hand up to quiet his sister. "The man was a right bastard and you know it. I wish Mother never met him. She deserved better than him."

"You shouldn't speak ill of the dead," Abigale warned, her hand leaving his shoulder as she approached the gravestones they stood near. From the arrangement twisted into her hair, she withdrew a flower, a blood-red rose, and placed it on the frozen soil. "Remember, also, that if Father and Mother never met, none of us would have been born. Mother always said she was happiest when she held her children."

Gustave grunted and began to fiddle with the violin again. It used to belong to his grandfather, his namesake Gustav Daaé, and the pesky thing made him want to pull out his hair on a good day. After a few minutes, a crystalline whine pierced the frozen air. He would lose himself in music. That was always better than losing himself in the past. Thinking about his parents always left him in a somber mood, and not because they both had passed.

No, it was because theirs was a love not meant to be and Gustave was the only one who saw it. He sheltered his siblings from the dark truth and carried his parents' secret on his soul. They all simply thought of Erik as a father, one whom they loved and whom showed his affection through strict discipline. Gustave knew the truth. He knew that he and his three siblings were meant to be more. He knew that Mother cried in her sleep as she mourned the imperfect children Erik stole away.

His mother was blind; an affliction which occurred when she was sixteen due to fever and Father took whole-hearted advantage of it. He manipulated her into becoming completely dependent on him. He tricked her into thinking that what they had was love. He kept her pregnant for the sake of compliance and attachment. Gustave knew this and there was nothing he could do.

As he poured his soul into the music, Gustave tried to push away all thoughts of little Elizabeth, who after a string of illnesses was stricken incapable of speech and prone to seizing fits, and of newborn Charles, whose poor lungs doomed him to a shortened life from the start but whose malformed jaw destined him to be taken too soon. Gustave had been five when he caught Erik smothering his two-year-old sister and sixteen when Charles vanished from his crib after Gustave succumbed to the basic need of sleep after a weeklong vigil at the cradle's side. Between those two losses and at least three miscarriages, Mother had been left a broken woman. True, she loved her living children, but she never completely healed, and how could she with a husband like Erik?

Tears crept down his cheeks as he recalled the death of his parents.

Some might think it a romantic tale: a monstrously disfigured man finding love in the arms of a blind woman. But that was not the whole story. Christine Daaé hadn't always been blind. She was once a rising star. Erik had been her mentor until he decided to make her his wife. The man he called Father was obsessed with, not in love with Mother. If he had loved her, he would have given her freedom, allowed her to become the Diva she was destined to be instead of stealing her away into his labyrinth of night to be at the mercy of his jealousies. If he had loved her, completely and fully, Erik would have loved his children as extensions of his beloved wife.

When Mother died from cancer when she was little more than thirty-five, Father did not mourn, he did not seek solace in his grieving. No, the selfish bastard hung himself in the same room Mother died and let his offspring find them both dead the next morning! There was no consideration for how it would affect the children. He did not care for the life sired by his loins. He thought only of himself and allowed obsession to consume him until it destroyed everything good in his life.

Mother loved him. She confessed it took her years to love him as a man after Erik broke her trust and shattered her illusions of a fathering guardian. Dependence, denial and devotion turned into a sickening parody of romance. Gustave wished he could have throttled his Father countless times when Mother told her story, her unfocused blue-eyes wet with tears, of how fear turned to love but how that love often felt precariously close to hate. Erik never beat his wife, thank God for small mercies, but why would he need to when she needed him to breathe?

She acted as if Father sustained her soul with his music and called him Angel. A murdering, temperamental brute that used fear to control his family and manipulate them all into thinking it was love was far from an angel. As beautiful as his creations were, Erik was not heaven sent. If anything, he was a demon plucked from hell.

With a violent tremble, Gustave dropped the bow and stared up at the grey sky. Today was the anniversary of their parent's deaths.

"Gustave…do you remember the lullaby Mother and Father used to sing together?"

Blearily, he blinked at his sister, whom was watching him with their mother's eyes. Gustave shivered and nodded with understanding. With trembling hands he picked the bow up and began to coax the simple melody from the strings, as his namesake did before him, and together, the two siblings began to sing. They were the children of the Angel of Music and his Swedish Soprano, music ran thick in their blood. Heaven had no choice but to listen to the mournful appeal of two nephilim as their souls cried out.

Somewhere, beyond the realm of reality, betwixt the lines of truth and fantasy, in a place not quite heaven and not quite hell, their appeal was echoed. A genius cursed to live without a face and a simple daughter of a fiddler, had found their peace in the haunting melody taking wing.

In music, their legacy remained.

.

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What is morality? Some would say it varies by culture, that there are discrepancies between class and creed due to the constraints and expectations of society. Others would claim there is an overreaching branch of rightness, of cosmic good. Yet there are even others who would dispute the differences between rightness and morality, between moral and just. If you were to ask almost any urchin from the streets, be he a king or beggar, he would claim there to be morality. After all, humans are notorious for their love of boxes, of neat little labels. It goes against the grit of human nature to accept that which does not fit the norm. There must be a name for it, even if it is as simple as good or evil, right or wrong, just or immoral.

I, for one, am not constrained by the shackles of petty humanity. The normal is but an illusion. Morality does not exist. Same as time. Humans need to label, to chart and control. If it cannot be written or numbered or calculated, it pricks the instinct to fight or flee. Like rapid dogs, beastly and frothing at the mouth, humans destroy all that they cannot understand in a fit of blind fury and fetid fear. I am different. I understand. I see that which no one else can see. I know that there are no things good nor evil, right or wrong, that morality is a man-made concept created to control. A system of guilt and reward. The humans feel good when they believe they do what is right and the guilt diverts them from what society claims is wrong.

Some may think of me as a madman, or a deviant at the very least. To claim to be beyond humanity when clothed in mortal flesh…What heresy! I believe in no God, in no divine creator. If He existed, no creature would be cursed as I, forced to live in a state of Truth whilst bound to the Earth in a hideous shell. Humans are animals, vindictive and fearful. If He existed, He never would have placed me upon the planet, to languish in the chaos of Knowing, as if I had swallowed a whole tree's worth of the biblical fruit of knowledge before my birth.

No one else Knows as I do. The Truth made me wise…made me different. Humans knew not what to think of an ugly genius in their midst. If only that were the extent. If I were merely ugly, Death would have long ago since claimed my weak heart and determined my fateful decay. If I were merely a genius, then the Truth would have eluded me, and I would have lived a doubtlessly charmed life…beautiful and shallow. And if I were merely an ugly genius, then I would have long ago resigned myself to the end of my beloved lasso and been done with the hellishness of this illusion known as life.

I am more.

I Know. I See. I Feel.

Some may call it madness, but I am quite sane. Quite aware. My choices are made without consideration to what is right or wrong, good or evil. Morality is but a concept. Death, however, is real. Survival is substantial. I did what I must to live, having long ago abandoned the chains of normality. It is why I took her, Christine, my little songbird…my beloved living wife. Society dictates that a good man would release a woman into the arms of another more capable of providing for her, or caring for her needs, of loving her. In contrast, society claims a bad man would do the opposite, would hold her against her will despite freedom being what she needs.

I took no heed of rightness or wrongness when I claimed Christine as my own, for eternity. She was mine from the instant I heard her sing as a child. As the years passed, I loved her. I desired her. She invoked passion in a heart grown cold from the Truth. From Knowing. She brought light into the darkness of my mind, she made clear the Truths. Without her, I was lost to the Knowledge in my head. Knowledge I could never escape.

Then I thought I would lose her. Those were precarious moments. Should she have died, I would have followed within the next beat of my heart. But I could not let her die. No, never. She was mine. Always mine.

A good man would have freed Christine after the first brush with disaster. She was innocent, undeserving of grief and sadness. A bad man would have killed her when she tried to defy him, dared to break his rules.

I caged the songbird I adored. I watched her flounder and wither before my eyes when she thought she had her freedom, unaware that I kept her wings clipped just enough to prevent her from flying away. I watched her suffering continue when I surrounded her with iron bars. It hurt me to see my beloved dying, thus I did what I needed to bring her back to me, to life.

I broke her wings.

She hated me for a time. She did not know I had done it…but she suspected. Then I caressed my songbird with song, filled her nest with chicks. She had all that she needed…except freedom.

I suppose she has that now. Ironic. I despise irony. It lays before me in the form of my broken shell of a wife. I captured my beloved, only to have her stolen away by the inevitable. In years, I have decades more in experience than my wife. She was young, too young, to be ripped from me. And now, now the Truth makes my head ache. No more clarity. No more song. Only pain. Only noise.

Christine gave her Angel of Music peace in life.

And he will chase her into death, be it decay or damnation.

I do not believe in God. I do not believe in Good or Evil. I do not believe in morality. I do not believe in miracles. I do not believe in Heaven, or Hell, or Angels.

I believe in the Truth. I believe in what I Know.

Some may call it madness, or selfishness, or even grief.

But I Know that I cannot live without Christine.

**fin**

A/N: (Aaand, we're at an end. Not what you were expecting, eh? To be honest, it wasn't the end I was expecting when I started The Fiddler's Daughter. In fact, this was supposed to be a haunting romance wrought with darkness that turned into light. I'm a sucker for a happy ending. I like reading them. I like writing them. But…this, I felt, was a more fulfilling end. A more honest end. The relationship between Erik and Christine became too unhealthy for there to be a happily ever after. I watched as their journey spiraled out of control, and into the dark. It is why this tale is not labeled Romance, but Drama alone. Some of my readers might feel I shortchanged them, took you straight past the end and right into the epilogue without prompt. But I could not bring myself to convey the slow decay of the soul in lengthy terms.

But just to clarify any questions, I have a few answers to provide in case you missed them in the text or I left it unstated for artistic purposes.

**How old is Erik?**

Think fifty to sixty. I lost track of the years in Kay's retelling, but part of the dynamic in Christine and Erik's relationship is a dramatic difference in age. I did not want it to be a normal, acceptable difference, albeit taboo. To put it bluntly: Erik is old. I guess making him in his mid-thirties is a popular means of making the relationship acceptable, especially to modern standards, but I digress…

**Why did Nadir and Christine start acting as if Erik was going to hurt everyone after he killed Buquet in defense of Christine?**

This reaction is inspired by cannon. Leroux's Christine was readily dramatic, same as ALW's, when it came to deaths. Nadir, an edited version of Kay's, knows Erik from the past as an assassin who is willing to destroy his creations in retaliation to being manipulated and hurt. He knows that Erik has a tender side for animals, but holds little value in human life. As was stated in the story, Erik promised Nadir that he would not hurt/kill anyone when Christine came into his care so that Nadir would not attempt to take Christine away. When he broke that vow, Nadir noticed the return of the heartless "Angel of Doom" would destroy if provoked. Of course, Christine being fifteen, was horribly conflicted by the moral implications of murder and the fact that Erik did it in her defense.

**Did Erik purposefully blind Christine?**

Yes. I affirmed it in Erik's monologue.

**It seems a bit too far out of character for Erik to impregnate Christine on purpose…why?**

Control. My Erik is a selfish bastard with an obsession and control issues. He is unstable without a true sense of morality. Yes, he freaks out in a child-like way around Christine, but in his head, he is a rational, thinking man. A brilliant man. But unable to cope with his emotions and his own humanity. He thinks of himself as Other. As a monster instead of a man. How does this relate to the question? Essentially, Erik knows sleeping with Christine and making sure she is pregnant will bind her further to him, make her vulnerable and reliant. He knows it is immoral, according to society norms, but because of his issues doesn't think of his actions as wrong, because he is Other.

**How many children?**

Five alive, two dead and three miscarried. Gustave is the oldest, followed by Elizabeth (deceased), Abigale, Pierre, Louise, Geoffrey and Charles (deceased). The middle three are not mentioned by name, but I included them here as a fun fact. Also, Gustave's middle name is Erik, much to Erik's displeasure.

**Why 'The Fiddler's Daughter'?**

This is where I should mention that the original idea for this story started out with Gustave being a famous violinist, married to an equally famous Soprano, who perform for nobleman across Europe, who end up having a musically inclined child…and Erik is actually an Angel. When Gustave was caught in the crossfire of an assassination attempt on one of his patrons during a performance, Erik stole Christine away to fashion her beautiful voice. Erik thinks of and refers to Christine's father as the Fiddler. And said Fiddler produced music which made him suffer sweet agony. Thus he claimed the Fiddler's Daughter in an attempt to reclaim the beautiful music. Somehow, that idea turned into this story, but the title stuck.

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Thank you for reading, reviewing and being supportive! Feel free to PM me, or ask questions through reviews. I will do my best to answer them. I loved writing this tale and feedback makes it all worth it. Once again, thank you and…goodnight!


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